Milo and the Dragon Cross

by Robert Jesten Upton

  When Milo picked his way to the place where Bori called him, he saw the cat sitting on a toppled marker stone. It was etched with lichens, telling its great age, but its shape was unmistakable.

  “It’s the same shape as the cross on my...” Milo said, touching his shirt where the little sack with the cross hung.

  “Thought you might think that was interesting,” Bori stated.

  “What do you think?” Milo asked him. “Shades—shadows, and now this? Do we go in?”

  “Einter doesn’t like the place much,” Bori observed.

  “But if we’ve got to learn a secret, wouldn’t an unknown place be a good place to look?”

  “Would going into a dangerous place be sensible?” Bori retorted.

  “Yes, if ‘dangerous’ is already part of everything we’ve got to do. Besides, I have a feeling about this place. I felt it right away. I think I’ve got to go here.”

  “Then I guess we go.”

  Milo told Einter about his intention while they chewed their dinner.

  “If yer plannin’ to go there, I suppose I ought to do what I can to give yuh some sort of protection from the shades what haunts the Korrigan.” Einter said.

  The next morning, Einter took Milo and Bori out into the edges of the forest. “Look,” he told Milo as he pointed out a very large, obviously ancient tree. Its trunk was of incredible girth, and its limbs towered over them, spreading out over a huge space. “See the leaves an’ the bark? That’s an oak. This one’s the guardian of the forest, so to speak. Climb up into its limbs an’ then introduce yerself to it. Ask it for protection. When yer feels its acceptance, pluck the acorn it offers yuh an’ then come on down.”

  Milo did as he was told. He climbed the trunk, using the rough bark like the stone of a cliff face. The trunk was so thick that he couldn’t begin to reach around more than just a little part of its girth. He climbed until he felt the movement of the tree responding to the wind. Looking down he could hardly see the ground below the many thick limbs he had climbed up and around.

  What an incredible tree, he thought, wondering how many centuries it had taken to get to such a size. “I’m Milo,” he told the tree, admiring the solid feel of it under him, holding him up. “I’d like to go into your forest, if I may.”

  Leaves rustled on every side, and he felt the ponderous sway of the living wood around him. Not knowing what to expect, he looked around, noticing how the sunlight filtered through the canopy. An ant ran out along the branch he was sitting on. As he watched, he saw it move farther and farther out, and then his glance fastened on an acorn lodged in a crease in the bark. “Is that it?” he asked the tree. “Is that the acorn I can take?”

  The tree swayed slightly, and Milo took it for a nod. He had to work himself out on the limb, straddling it like the back of a horse. Carefully he lifted and runched himself forward. It wasn’t particularly difficult, but it was an awfully long way above the ground. When he got out to the place where the acorn was he picked it up. “Thank you,” he said before working his way back to the main trunk to climb down.

  With his feet on firm ground again, he patted the trunk. “Long life to you,” he told the tree and then turned to where Bori sat waiting.

  “Where’s Einter?” he asked the cat.

  “He went that way,” Bori said, rotating his ears to hear the sounds that were too faint for Milo to catch.

  Milo followed as the cat marched through the grasses and weeds that covered the ground beneath the trees. They found Einter beneath another tree, wrapping a red string around two twigs that he had taken from the tree to make a cross.

  “This tree’s called a rowan,” Einter said, handing Milo the little charm he had made. “This little cross will introduce yuh to whatever yuh meet in there. Did yuh get yer acorn?”

  Milo showed it to him.

  “Put that into yer pocket. It’ll keep yuh from getting’ lost. Let’s see about findin’ some other trees to help yuh out.”

  “How do you know this stuff?” Milo asked.

  Einter tapped the side of his nose as if that explained something. “My Pap,” he said. “He got it from his pap and his pap before him got from his pap an’ so on. We in my family haven’t forgot the Old Ways like some. An’ these Shades—they’ll see that you know somethin’ about the Old Way, an’ that’ll make ‘em curious. Then maybe they’ll show theyselves to yuh.

  “Here!” he said, stopping beside another tree. “This one’s an alder.” He patted the gnarled trunk and said some quiet words to the tree, then cut a small branch with his knife and began peeling the bark. He used another twig to poke out the soft pith in the center of the finger-sized section of branch, then cut a slot into one end.

  “Here,” he said. “Blow into it.”

  Milo did, and to his surprise it made a whistle.

  “That’s a fairy flute,” Einter told him. “Yuh blow that ever so often as yuh walk along. It’ll announce yuh to whatever Shades are around.”

  They moved on to another tree.

  “This one’s an elm. Take this...” He handed Milo a small flask. “Ask it for its help in findin’ the folk yuh want to meet up with. Then pour out a little of the mead in the flask for an offerin’.”

  Milo did as he was instructed, then thanked the tree and moved along with Einter and Bori.

  “Yuh see this tree here?” Einter asked, directing Milo to make note of its details to insure he could recognize its type on his own. “It’s a hawthorn. After yuh been travelin’ a while until yer deep into the woods, an’ yuh been blowin’ on that whistle from time t’ time, an’ yuh find a whole grove of hawthorn in a bunch, go into ‘em an’ sit down. Blow the flute to call out the Shades an’ wait.” He patted the tree like an old friend before they moved on.

  “One more,” he told Milo. “This one’s an elder. Not an alder, like the one we made the flute from: an elder. Ask it if yuh can take a few twigs, an’ cut ‘em like so.”

  Einter indicated how Milo should cut them and weave them into a circlet. “When yuh sit down in that hawthorn thicket, put that on yer head like a crown. It’ll let yuh see the Shades when they come. Without it, yuh won’t see nothin’. All yuh’d see is motion out of the corner of yer eye, an’ they’d be tryin’ to trick yuh and get yuh lost an’ crazy. When yuh see one of ‘em, look ‘im straight in the eye an’ ask his name. When he tells yuh, then yuh’ll have a conversation to ask ‘em what yuh want. If he knows, he’s bound to tell yuh. But only if yeh’ve got his name first. He’ll lie to yuh if he can. But not if yeh’ve got his name first. Be sure to ask exactly what it is yuh wants to know. Think about that as yuh travel through t’ woods before yuh meet ‘im. Rehearse what yer needin’ to ask over an’ over in yer mind, because he’ll answer the question yuh asks, but not necessarily the one yuh mean. Don’t worry about keepin’ yer secret. He won’t be tellin’ yer secret to nobody else.”

  “These...Shades. They’re dangerous, aren’t they?” Milo asked apprehensively.

  “Yep, but not the same way a bear or somthin’ like that is dangerous. Dangerous tricky. Malicious. They hates humans, because people have forgot to respect ‘em and the forests they live in. Folks have come to hate anything they can’t own, and they can’t own the deep forest. They want to cut roads through it, clear land for farms, cut trees for timber or just to burn ‘em up to clear ‘em away. That destroys the forests an’ the homes of the deep forest folk what ye’ll be lookin’ for.”

  They returned to Einter’s wagon and Milo helped him hitch up Senster and Dexter.

  “Well, I best be on my way an’ yuh’ll be on yers,” Einter said, offering Milo his hand to shake. “Been good travelin’ with yuh.” He gave Bori a couple of pats as the cat lifted his tail high in farewell. “Remember all what Renee told yuh, and what I taught yuh about the trees, an’ yeh’ll be all right. Take care,” and Einter mounted his cart.

  Milo wanted to say something to thank Einter for all his help and companionship, but the lump in h
is throat kept him from saying a thing. Einter flicked his whip and the brothers started off, setting the cart into creaking motion, clanking away to some place beyond Milo’s part. Milo just stood there, watching the cart recede as the hole inside him filled with an awful sense of loneliness.

  Einter, the cart, and the oxen had vanished—even the sound had faded—before Milo could gather himself again.

  “We better be going,” he told Bori in a diminished voice.

  “I wonder if these Shades we’re looking for have saucers of milk?” Bori mused.

  13

  The Seen and Unseen

  The forest ran on and on. There were no breaks in the canopy once Milo and Bori penetrated its depths, and the forest floor lay in gloom. The road, its bed filled in with leaf litter, was only discernable from any other part of the forest floor by a relative absence of trees, leaving an open path to walk along.

  Milo’s spirits had not improved from the low point of watching Einter’s cart fade out of sight. Homesick, lonely, and frightened, he dreaded the arrival of night and tried not to think about what unknowns might be afoot with full darkness.

  “I like night time,” Bori offered when they stopped and Milo buried himself into his cloak and a nest of leaves. “I’ll stand watch.” Bori hadn’t followed his usual habit of slipping away for a hunt as he usually did come nightfall. “I can see just fine, and hear and smell. I’ll let you know if there’s anything out there you need to know about.”

  Somehow, this assurance hardly helped Milo’s mood. If there was something out there, what could one cat—even a fairly large one like Bori—do about it? Knowing something was out there would be no better than being afraid that there might be.

  “Why did I come here,” Milo whined, fighting back tears and having second thoughts about facing the forest alone. The choice he’d made by daylight, out in the open under the bright sun and blue sky, seemed to be foolish bravado now that he was alone in the dark.

  “You came to look for help,” Bori reminded him. “And you’re just worried now because it’s dark. There’s no difference between day and night except you can’t see in the dark. A human limitation. Try thinking of yourself as a cat. I can see just fine. Night? Day? Same threat. Think how you felt while it was daytime. You were confident enough then.”

  “No. I wasn’t.”

  “Okay, so you weren’t. But that wasn’t because of your surroundings. It was because of how you felt inside. Either way, I’m here and you aren’t by yourself.”

  Milo patted him. It made him feel better, and Bori’s purr was worth more than Milo could say. “Come on,” he told the cat. “Crawl under the cloak and let’s get some sleep.”

  Milo didn’t remember when he went to sleep, but he knew when he woke up, so he knew that he had slept, finally, after listening to what had seemed like hours and hours of sounds out in the darkness. He knew that it was morning, or nearly so, even though it was still as dark as it had been, because the sounds he heard now were of birds twittering and making dawn talk up in the treetops. Bori was snoring. He did that. Milo lay still, trying to sort out the dream he’d been having just before he woke up. He remembered the feeling of swaying. He had been in the oak tree. He also remembered parts of a long conversation. He remembered asking the oak, “I don’t know what to ask.”

  “What do you want to know?” the oak asked back.

  Dreaming Milo hadn’t noticed that it was strange that the oak talked, because he remembered that was why he was up in the tree: to talk with it. “I need to know what to do with the cross.” In the dream he had known it was okay to mention the cross, because the oak already knew all about it.

  “Why do you think that the forest folk will know that?” the tree asked.

  Milo shrugged. “Because Dame Renee said I was to go to the place of shadows. And because I’m supposed to follow my instincts. This seemed like the right thing to do. What do you think?”

  The tree swayed gently. “I think you’re right. The forest folk know things like that, because they are very old, at least for legged folk. They’ve crossed over entirely into the magic realm and since the cross has everything to do with Magic, it’s logical that they would know.”

  “Yeah. I guessed that.” Milo realized right then that he did know that. “If I can return it to the place where it belongs, it’ll heal a rift in the magic realm. So I have to know where to take it.”

  “Perhaps it isn’t quite that simple. Perhaps you should let the cross lead you to the place it needs to go. So if you asked the forest spirit straight out, he could tell you where to take it, but that would be his trick because it isn’t as important to take it to that place as it is to find out what the cross needs in order to return to the place it must go.”

  “What do I ask, then?”

  “How about: ‘Who knows the source of the cross?’ Then you’ll know who can tell you what you need to know about the cross.”

  “But how will I know how to find out where that person is?”

  “You get three questions,” the oak told him. “Did you know that?”

  Milo shook his head no, without even wondering how the tree could see that.

  “So that’s your first question. The next question is: ‘Where do I find him?’”

  The oak was silent, except for the shush of breeze through its leaves and branches until Milo had absorbed the first two questions. “The last question is more a request, but because you have learned his name, and he has answered your first and second questions, he’ll be obliged to comply with the third. This is it: ‘Lead me to the place where I can find the one who knows the source of the cross.’ Remember—the forest folk are full of tricks, but whatever his answer is, it must be truthful. They know that the truth can be as tricky, depending on how it is given, as a lie. So do what he says. It may be something that makes no sense at all, but if you discard it as complete nonsense, you’ll be falling for his trick.”

  That’s all Milo could remember from his dream conversation. There was more, but he couldn’t draw it back together.

  Bori woke up and stretched. “Time to go?” he asked.

  “Yeah. I think so,” Milo told him.

  They walked all day through the woods, with Milo blowing the flute from time to time. Milo believed it must be a bright and sunny day. Yesterday could have been overcast. The forest didn’t seem as dark as it had the day before, although he still couldn’t see the sky through the canopy of leaves.

  He also noticed motion that hadn’t seemed to be there the day before. Each time he turned to look in the direction of the movement, there was nothing to see. By late afternoon, with twilight already settling in beneath the trees, he and Bori came onto a grove of trees like the ones Einter had pointed out to him. “Those are hawthorns, I think,” he told Bori.

  “Like the ones you’re supposed to sit under?” Bori asked.

  “Yeah. That’s them.” He blew the flute and adjusted the little crossed-twig talisman Einter had given him, then put the elder wreath on his head.

  They chose a place and Milo sat down with his back against the bole of one of the bigger trees and between the buttresses of two thick, gnarled roots. Having the tree wrapped halfway around him felt comforting without restricting his ability to see. Bori sat at his knee, using his night vision to peer out into the gathering darkness.

  As night fell, the motions Milo saw fleetingly from the corners of his eyes increased. “Do you see what’s moving around out there?” he whispered to Bori.

  “No. Nor do I smell anything that smells any different from the forest,” Bori answered. “Every time I look to where something flits, there’s nothing there but shadows.”

  Milo blew the flute. It had one tone only, so he tried making up songs that had only one note. He readjusted the elder-twig crown and then he saw something.

  A face. Scowling at him. He also heard whisperings that seemed to call to him, urging him to follow them. Instead of moving away from the shelter of the tree
bole, he focused on the peering face.

  It was barely discernable in the darkness and could be nothing more than the configuration in the bark of a tree, but then it blinked.

  “What’s your name?” Milo asked aloud. The whispering suddenly stopped. His own voice sounded over-loud. The scowl on the peering face deepened to a grimace of unspeakable hate and spite.

  “What is your name?” Milo repeated.

  “Musail!” spat out the reply, like an insult. “Who are you to invade our forest?”

  “I came to talk to you. Talk to me and I’ll go away again.” Milo felt Bori’s tail bushed up and his body crouched, wound up like a spring ready to explode.

  The face edged in closer, and a body became discernable, bearing it.

  “I would like to ask you some questions,” Milo said, meaning the ones from his dream that he had rehearsed over and over during the day.

  “How do you know the craft of the woods?” Musail accused.

  “I had a teacher who knows something of the Old Wisdom. He sent me here to find you.”

  “You may ask, then,” Musail said, somewhat assuaged.

  “Okay; first, then: Who knows the source of the cross I carry?”

  “Let’s see it.”

  Milo held Musail with his eye as he opened the little sack he kept the cross in. He worked it free and held it up, feeling a disturbing tingle as he did so.

  Musail’s scowl softened. “Where did you get that?” he asked Milo.

  “That’s unimportant. Where I take it is my concern. Answer my question.”

  “Ask Heronsuge. He knows it well.”

  Milo noticed the look of cunning that passed across Musail’s features.

  “Where do I find him?”

  “Beneath the Great Barrow,” Musail answered with a sneer. “It’s not a place for mortals unless they wish for immortality.” The sneer became a spiteful grin.