With a few further words of direction, Kestrel and the imps began to move into the village around the manor, as the elves from Stonewalls spread out to capture escapees from the rear of the manor. Kestrel’s frightening glow, and his impervious shield, made him an overwhelming force in the eyes of the frightened Center Trunk guards, who fled from Kestrel and the imps that swooped down from the dark sky to harry them. The waiting weir of elves in the back of the manor gathered them up and accepted their bloodless surrenders.
Only an hour was needed to have the manor back under control in Oaktown.
“Where’s Bernie?” Kestrel asked after the mild conflict was at an end. He stood in the yard of the manor, in front of a large crowd. The scene was illuminated by torches and balls of glowing energy Kestrel had attached to the exterior walls of manor.
“Here I am milord,” a voice called from the left side of the crowd.
“Bernie, it’s good to hear your voice!” Kestrel’s voice was full of pleasure at the knowledge that the cook was alive and well. “Would you want to try to feed all these heroes yet tonight?”
The crowd murmured appreciatively.
“As you may not know, my lord,” Bernie answered as he shouldered his way forward through the crowd to approach Kestrel, “these folks from Center Trunk that occupied the manor ate like a plague of locusts, and they felt entitled to all the food they could find.
“But,” he paused, “it turns out they didn’t put much energy into looking!
“I’ve got several pantries they never found,” he laughed as he spoke, and the crowd laughed with him. “Why, I’ve even got some dried mushrooms for these imp friends of yours who seem to have pulled their weight tonight in the fight,” he spoke loudly as he faced upwards towards the sky, drawing a particular round of cheers from the imp audience above.
“Where are our prisoners from tonight being held?” Kestrel asked one of his supporters as the rally started to disperse.
“They’re all in a pair of sheds in the back, your lordship,” one of the Oaktown inhabitants answered, and led Kestrel to where a score of his followers kept watch over the dejected captives.
“Tonight you’ll be held here as our prisoners,” Kestrel told the assembled Center Trunk supporters.
“And first thing tomorrow morning you’ll all be released and sent on your way back to Center Trunk. We’ll do you no harm, as long as you never come back to the Marches again, nor ever harm any of our people again,” he declared.
“What if some of us would rather stay and support you, my lord?” one voice spoke up from the captives, drawing sounds of surprise from listeners on both sides of the confrontation.
“I was a lieutenant under Captain Lim briefly in the spring, right after you went to the north, and he had nothing but good things to say about you. When the Princess upended her father at the end of the summer, the captain took a squad of men he’d known for a long time, and just vanished,” the officer said, struggling to his feet to stand, while his hands remained tied behind his back.
“I heard later that they all went up to Firheng to join the resistance up there,” the man said. “But I was assigned down here and didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to disobey orders,” he trailed off.
Kestrel studied the man, sensing that he was telling the truth.
“It wasn’t long after that before the consort-presumptive fled to Firheng too,” the elf added.
“Hampus?” Kestrel asked in astonishment. “Hampus ran away from the princess?”
“He did, and that made her furious. She had several guards executed for letting him get away,” the officer said.
“We’ll talk in the morning,” Kestrel said. “Odare,” he spoke up into the sky, calling a trio of imps to come swooping down in response to his voice, and making the prisoners cringe in fear at the appearance of the flying warriors.
“Have half your squad help keep an eye on the prisoners, while the other half enjoys the feast, then switch shifts, and keep some posted here to help watch the prisoners all night,” Kestrel commanded his imp soldiers.
“Will all members have mushrooms?” Killcen asked intently.
“We’ll make sure they do,” Kestrel solemnly promised.
The celebration feast lasted late into the night, and Kestrel got little sleep, choosing to sleep in a tree rather than the in the blighted interior of his manor home. He awoke after the sunrise in the morning, and sleepily presided over the release of the prisoners under the wary, watchful eyes of dozens of residents of the village, who were glad to see the occupying forces ousted.
The lieutenant who had asked for clemency, Pierodot, and two soldiers who also asked to join Kestrel’s forces were allowed to stay, after Kestrel scrutinized them and allowed the imps to observe them as well. Kestrel didn’t ascribe any particular power to the imps’ examination, other than to allow him to see who grew nervous – perhaps with a guilty conscious – when the imps were close by.
“We’ll need to establish a militia,” Kestrel told his assembled forces from Slaggyford, Stonewalls, and Oaktown itself later that morning. “We’ll need to go out to all the villages of the Marches to set them free. After that, we’ll have to protect the Marches from a new invasion. And I intend to take forces up to Firheng to help our friends up there.”
“Will you take an army to Center Trunk to overthrow the princess?” Pierodot boldly asked.
“If I have to,” Kestrel answered soberly, and he dismissed the group to begin organizing.
Kestrel took two days to settle the conditions and emotions at Oaktown, then began to send raiding parties of imps and elves to all the villages in the region that were known to be occupied by soldiers from Center Trunk. Though many of the Center Trunk forces had fled back towards the capitol as word of Kestrel’s victory at Oaktown had spread, several were taken captive, and Kestrel made sure they were put to work, scrubbing away graffiti, mending broken fences and structures, and otherwise assisting in the repair of the damage and destruction they had wastefully caused in Oaktown.
Assured that the settlement was safely under control with his followers securely in charge, Kestrel personally led the patrol of imps and elves that went to Cedar Gully to remove the Center Trunk forces there. The small outpost of bullying guards fled hours before Kestrel’s forces arrived, having lost a part of the roster during his earlier visit to the village, and having heard about his conquest of Oaktown and the surrounding settlements.
The woman who had fed him on his return to the Eastern Forest was the first to greet him as he led his squad into the village.
“I promised I’d return!” Kestrel grinned and shouted as the woman waved wildly from her porch, one arm wrapped around the shoulder of her son.
“That you did, my lord, and I never doubted it,” she assured Kestrel as he walked past. The residents of the village put together a communal dinner that afternoon to celebrate their liberation, while Kestrel led Mulberry to visit the empty house on the eastern edge of the village.
“This is where the portal is,” he told his friend, as he placed a hand on the stone basement wall that had opened to allow him to return to the lands of the Eastern Forest. He held his other hand aloft, glowing with light to illuminate the dark subterranean chamber.
The stone beneath his hand began to feel suddenly warm, and then grew soft.
“Something’s happening,” he murmured with concern.
“Is there an alarm?” Mulberry asked, just as portions of the stone wall slid within other portions, a quick dilation that produced a brightly lit opening, through which the elf and the imp could see a brightly lit stream bank in an outdoor setting.
And they saw something else too, something that made Mulberry shriek in fear.
“I’ll hold it back, Kestrel-friend; flee!” she shouted as she flew to a position in front of him.
In the opening stood Medeina, the goddess of the wilderness in the land of the Parstoles. She had been Kestrel’s guide when he had been
journeying through her lands in search of his path back to the lands of the Inner Seas. Kestrel had seen the goddess adopt two very different guises during his brief journey with her. In one guise she appeared to be a small, harmless forest creature, one that Kestrel had easily carried with him during portions of the journey.
Her other chosen form was the one that she displayed now. She appeared to be a Parstole, the race that had inhabited her land, and been conquered by the Viathins. She was nearly as tall as Kestrel, and fiery red in color. On her forehead were two notable nubs, emblematic of the full horns Kestrel had seen on the heads of male Parstoles. Her facial features were little different from those of a human or elf; Kestrel had met her immediately after leaving the insect-like Skyes, and her resemblance to his own world’s races had endeared her to him. Her body form was almost that of a voluptuous human female, except for the long swaying tail that idly swung behind her. It was an appendage that was prehensile, Kestrel had discovered.
“Where is my welcome, Kestrel dear?” Medeina asked.
“What are you doing here? Why did you open the portal, my lady?” Kestrel replied.
“Do you know this monster, Kestrel lord?” Mulberry asked, stunned by the calm demeanor of the conversation.
“Tell the small creature who I am, sweet Kestrel, god-who-was,” Medeina spoke up, and then stepped through the orifice and stood calmly in the basement with Kestrel and Mulberry. She was glowing, and as the opening behind her silently closed, the room was lit primarily by her lurid color, as well as the lesser light from Kestrel’s still glowing hand.
“My lady, why do you come here?” Kestrel repeated his question.
“I told you before, Kestrel. My world is a bit boring compared to the bubbling caldron of races and deities that your world has. My wilderness is doing well now; it is recovering from the damage that the Viathins did, and it is prospering in the present situation of a reduced Parstole population,” she smiled knowingly. “So when I sensed your presence by the portal, I realized that you must have come to see me, and even to invite me to come visit this vibrant world of yours.
“That was what you had in mind, wasn’t it?” she asked.
“Kestrel, who is this?” Mulberry’s voice was shrill, as the imp flew around in a circle and came to a stop next to his ear.
“This is a goddess,” Kestrel said faintly. “This is the goddess Medeina, of the wilderness, in that other land you just saw through the portal.”
“Is this small one your lover, Kestrel-companion?” Medeina asked. “Do you prefer smaller forms? Would you prefer me like this?” she asked, and she transformed into the small shelled forest animal that Kestrel had first seen her as.
“I,” Kestrel stammered faintly, “I have no preference, your ladyship. You can be whoever you choose.”
“I chose to be your companion for a while. I want you to show me your world, to let me taste the flavor of variety and conflict and passion,” Medeina answered forthrightly.
“You had a goddess lover in another world?” Mulberry breathed the question.
Medeina burst into laughter.
“Heavens small one, he’s in love with someone else, or at least he thinks he is, or maybe he just wants to be. He’s a confused one, but the confusion’s not my fault,” Medeina answered.
“But I could pretend to be his lover, if you think that would be best. Who would you want me to be?” she asked Kestrel.
“Just be yourself,” Kestrel answered, at a loss for words.
“No, I’m going to travel with you, and I’m going to blend right in to the general population, so that no one suspects I am a goddess. I have to look like someone people would expect to be with you.” She stepped closer to him, and he watched apprehensively as she reached up with her left hand and placed a pair of fingertips against his temple. He lost all control of his thoughts, as they swirled wildly under her influence – ideas and memories and dreams all mixed together as the goddess sifted through them cavalierly.
“Stop!” Kestrel shouted, instinct cutting through the confusion. He swung his hand up and knocked her fingers away from his skull, ending the dizzying churning. “Stop it,” he repeated. “You shouldn’t do that.”
He looked at her and gasped at what he saw.
“Kestrel-friend! What have you brought into our world?” Mulberry asked apprehensively.
“Do you like me now?” Medeina asked, as Kestrel stared.
The out-world deity had changed her shape, and taken on the appearance of Kestrel’s former spymaster officer, Sylvan, the deceased elf who had engineered Kestrel’s immersion into human culture and human society.
“Is this appropriate?” Medeina-as-Sylvan asked.
“No,” Kestrel said in a strong voice. “He’s dead. People would be scared to see a dead elf walking around.”
“Let me look for another identity,” the goddess said carelessly, reaching her hand towards Kestrel again. “I want an appearance that will allow me to blend in among your people, so that I may observe things as if I was a mortal.”
“No, pick Lark!” he barked out, pulling his head back out of her reach.
“Ah,” the deity said. She changed instantaneously. “This one? Is this better?” she asked, as she struck a pose, her body and face now replicating the daughter of the Duke Listay of Uniontown.
“Yes, that’s a perfect copy,” Kestrel said faintly.
Medeina had perfectly copied the image of Lark from his memory, recreating herself as the human girl, with the same dark hair.
“Kestrel friend, I do not know this human you have chosen, which troubles me – you should scarcely be permitted to choose your own mate without my consent, based on your past indiscretions. More importantly, a human appearance is hardly going to fit in among these elves, is it Kestrel-lover?” Mulberry pointed out.
“Ah, the dynamics of different races! How delightful!” Medeina purred. “Let me pick an appearance from a race that will fit in with you,” she paused, and then started to reach her hand towards Kestrel again.
“No,” Kestrel protested and bobbed away again. “I know who – Tewks!” Kestrel hastily shouted out the name of an elf.
Medeina studied him for several long, silent seconds, then suddenly transformed again and became the precocious page from the court at Kirevee, in the kingdom of the Northern Forest elves.
“No,” she said after a moment’s reflection. “I don’t like this. No one will pay any attention to me.”
“That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Kestrel asked. “You want to be able to observe the world without being the center of attention.”
“Hmm, no. I don’t want to be completely anonymous,” Medeina said. “I caught a glimpse, of someone in that cluttered mind of yours. I know who I’ll become.” She started to transform again, and then smiled a charming smile at Kestrel as she raised an eyebrow.
“Well?” she asked.
“That will work,” Kestrel nodded approval, secretly relieved at her choice. She was Cheryl, the girl he had first had a crush on. Cheryl who had been the daughter of his commanding officer in Elmheng, back before everything that had changed his world had begun to erupt.
“No,” Medeina said as she studied Kestrel through slitted eyes. “That was too easy; you gave in too easy. This one isn’t flashy enough. There is one in there – I know it. Shall I come in and find the perfect identity in your head?” she hissed the question.
“No,” Kestrel said with resignation.
“Is it Moorin?” Mulberry asked. “Is that who she should become, Kestrel-strained heart?”
“That’s who I think she should become,” Kestrel agreed mournfully.
Medeina stood in her guise of a budding elven matron, and looked at Kestrel with a cocked head. “Ah, that one intrigues me. Yes, that’s the answer for today.” She made her final transformation, and became a duplicate of Moorin, the extraordinary beautiful half elf-half human from the Northern Forest, who had enchanted Kestrel and then broken his h
eart by leaving him to marry the lord of the southern elves.
“Kestrel friend, you and I must have a talk,” Mulberry said in a serious voice.
“There will be no revealing who I am, imp,” Medeina said in an ominous tone to Mulberry. “Nor from you of course, either,” she directed her words to Kestrel. “I want to go through this world as though I were an ordinary person, and observe how you all live your lives in such chaotic circumstances.”
“That appearance is not close to ordinary,” Kestrel warned her. “You’ll be watched and fawned over by ever man who meets you.”
“That sounds like an acceptable compromise,” Medeina laughed. “Now, let’s move on, shall we? I want to see this world of yours.”
With that Kestrel looked at Mulberry, who rolled her eyes at him, and they left the cellar where the extraordinary visitation had occurred.
Chapter 4
“Who’s this?” was the first question the other members of Kestrel’s newly-created militia patrol in Cedar Gully asked when Kestrel and Mulberry emerged with the disguised Parstole goddess beside them.
“This is a friend of mine,” Kestrel said hesitantly.
“I was hiding from those evil elves, until Kestrel saved me,” Medeina said boldly.
"I'm grateful that Kestrel will watch out for me," she added. "I've been hiding in the forest since I ran away from home."
"Will we take her back to her village?" one of his followers asked.
"No, I want to attach myself to Kestrel," Medeina said nonchalantly. "I'm sure he'll take me under his wing and watch over me wherever he goes."
"We'll be going to some dangerous places miss," the elf replied. "You should go back home now that things are safe in the Marches again."
"Have you seen Kestrel in action?" Medeina asked. "I'm sure I'll be safe," she said complacently.
Mulberry dropped down and touched Kestrel’s shoulder. "You should move this along, Kestrel-confused," the imp murmured.
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