by B. V. Larson
It was bigger than it looked in the distance. Surely, it had to have been a great king they had buried here. Perhaps it was an entire family. She wondered briefly what they’d been like, and if their name had indeed been Rabing, as Myrrdin had suggested.
A soft sensation came to her as she eyed the quiet scene. Was it a sight or a sound? Oddly, she wasn’t sure at first, thinking perhaps it was both. The moonlight seemed to brighten overhead as she stood there. Then the music came clear and swelled in volume, and she knew the truth. It was a lute, with a masterful player plucking the strings. The lute was her favorite, she thought. How had the player known?
“Step forward musician, that I may know you,” she said. She hoped desperately it would not be the Dark Bard. She did not want to think for a second she had enjoyed the sweet music of a dead-thing.
A figure walked around the mound toward her. He was a glimmering figure—like a man, but smaller and more lithe. He looked both young and ancient at the same time. His face was full of cheer and sadness in equal measure. Seeing his fine features, Telyn’s breath caught in her lungs and she had to tell herself to continue breathing. His strumming continued, and it filled the air with sweet music.
“Don’t you like my playing, maiden of the River?” the elf asked her.
“Indeed I do,” said Teyln, sighing the words. “I think, in fact, I like it overmuch.”
“Good,” said the elf. He walked closer until he stood a dozen steps from her. He smiled and tilted his head. “How is it I’ve been so fortunate this evening?”
“Fortunate? How so?”
“Why, to find a girl like you here in this lonely place.”
Telyn eyed him warily. “I search for another.”
“Indeed?” said the elf, stepping three paces closer. “Is he more fair than I?”
Telyn paused, but she forced herself to nod. “Yes. He is to me.”
The elf stepped backward, as if injured by her words. “But he is not here, is he? He has perhaps, forsaken you for another? Will you not follow me, maiden? I will lead you to a place of—”
“No,” she said, and she reached into her tunic and pulled out her ward, which was a river stone worn through naturally and looped with a thong. “This stone is not drilled. It is powerful enough to keep your kind at bay.”
The elf’s upper lip twitched. Was that a sneer? He recovered quickly, and turned the twitch into a fresh smile.
“Why would I need to be kept at bay?” he asked, and his voice was as smooth and soothing as his music. “Can we not just talk? You have nothing to fear from me while wearing your ward.”
Telyn blinked at him. “I would know your name, elf.”
“I will tell you, if you would only agree to walk with me. I’m so lonely this night. It is quiet here, and all the others have gone to play around mounds that do not reek of death.”
Telyn’s heart pounded at his words. What did this being know? Did he speak of Brand?
“I will walk with you,” she said.
He turned, and offered her the crook of his elbow. It was a courtly gesture. Telyn took his arm without thinking and together they walked beside the mound.
“Now, tell me your name,” she said.
“My,” he chuckled, “you are a strong one. Most would have forgotten to insist. Wouldn’t you like to know of other things? Such as what has become of your beloved?”
Telyn’s worries resurfaced, but she regained her composure quickly. “One thing at a time. Tell me your name, elf. You have promised.”
The elf gave a shuddering sigh. “I have promised,” he echoed. “I am known as Puck.”
Telyn almost ripped her arm from his, but controlled herself. She knew something of the lore of elves. This one was high indeed in their lineage. “Are you then…the son of Oberon?”
“The same,” he said. “Would you like to dance? I sense you are an excellent dancer. And I am an excellent judge in these matters!”
Telyn, to her surprise, found she did wanted to dance with him. She imagined herself twirling and kicking while he smiled and both their eyes shone with shared moonlight. The strumming…but how could she be hearing his lute now, when he was no longer playing it?
She shook her head. “Not now,” she said. “Let’s just talk for a time.”
Puck pouted. “Always is this the way of the maiden,” he said. “They claim we influence them, but in truth, we males are always the ones that are manipulated! How many hours have I spent wooing softly for so few moments of bliss? The ledger is harshly in your kind’s favor, I assure you.”
Telyn laughed. Puck looked at her, and laughed with her. The two stepped along their way more lightly now. They were as two schoolchildren skipping down a road.
She smiled broadly and felt herself slightly drunk. Her feet were light beneath her, and they carried her effortlessly forward on the path. Looking down, she noted that there was a path beneath her feet. A shining path of silver grasses. She halted, swallowing a giggle that tried to burst from her throat.
“You’ve tricked me!”
Puck looked at her in mock horror. “How so?”
“This path! We walk beside the mound!” she said, ripping her arm loose from his. “How many times have we made the circuit? If I step from the silver grasses, will I be lost in-between?”
He cocked his head and gave her an appreciative nod. “You are no foolish stripling, are you? Rare it is I meet one of your age who knows of these things.”
“Answer my questions, Puck,” she said.
He shook his head, his face absurdly mournful. “Alas, I am not in your power, fine lady.”
“I know your name.”
“And thus, you can call upon me, and perhaps do me some small harm. But you can’t command me, as I have made you no promises.”
“I will walk with you no further.”
“You make me sad,” he said. “Are you certain?”
“Yes,” she said firmly.
Shaking his head, the elf backed away from her, continuing on the path toward the Twilight Lands. He circled the mound and vanished from her sight ahead.
“Should you change your mind,” he called, his voice sounding distant and echoing, as if he called up to her from the bottom of a dark well. “Come find me!”
And so Telyn found herself standing alone beside the mound. She knew a deeper terror then than she’d ever felt before. She tried to think, but it was difficult. She knew that if she had stepped too far along the path, she could not deviate from it or she would be lost forever between the world of the Fae and the world which was her home. On the other hand, if she continued on her way forward, she would arrive in a strange world where she had never been. She would surely be lost there, more surely than she was now.
Looking this way and that, she almost called for Puck to return and guide her. Perhaps she could survive his gentle touches and caresses at least long enough to return home.
Telyn opened her mouth, but no calls issued forth. She stopped herself. This was exactly what the elf wanted. This is why he had abandoned her. He was waiting. He would come back, after a frightening delay. He would wait until she sobbed for him, frozen with fear on this path of moonlight. He would wait until she offered to remove her ward…he would wait until she was his.
She made a decision. She turned around on the path, and took a step backward along it. She took another, and then a third. This was dangerous, she knew. Reversing oneself while circling a mound was possible, but increasingly difficult the further along one had gone. She was not sure how far she had come, but she felt certain that if she called for Puck’s help, she would be lost forever. She would never have Brand—possibly, she would never see her world again.
Clearly envisioning Brand and clutching at her ward with both hands, she took six more steps along the path, then two dozen more.
The land wavered before her. Instead of silver, the grasses appeared coppery. At times, they bled until they became the color of a sunset over water. She too
k another step, and could no longer see the path at all. There was nowhere to go. Tears streamed from her face. She did not look back. She did not want to see if the rest of the world was gone behind her as well. She lifted her foot to take yet another step. There was nothing else to do. Perhaps she could still win through and find her way home, somehow.
A hand fell upon her shoulder. She jumped and put her foot back down without taking the step. She whirled her head around.
Puck stood there, very close to her. “Don’t move,” he said in a whisper.
“I don’t want to go with you.”
“You’ve made that abundantly clear, stubborn child,” he said, but there was some gentleness in his voice. “Why won’t you come with me? Would it be so unpleasant? Am I so unsightly?”
“You are beautiful, and I’m sure the experience would be glorious. But my heart belongs to another.”
“Humph,” said the elf. He reached up and took her chin very delicately. His touched had a burning coolness that was exciting and slightly painful at the same time. She allowed him to guide her with his touch, as she was desperate.
He turned her head, and pointed a long finger to her left. There, she saw the silver grasses. They were no more than three steps away.
“I see the way,” she whispered. She turned to thank him, but there was no one there. She knew a new moment of panic. She turned her head slowly and found that only when it was directed precisely so, was she able to see the path. She aimed herself that way, and took three quick steps.
Telyn found herself on the path again. Her body was sheened with sweat, despite the coolness of the night air. She followed the path around the mound without further incident until her world was strong and vibrant around her.
It was just before dawn when she returned to her own world. It had taken half the night, she realized, to walk less than a mile. But that was no matter. All that mattered was that she had returned.
When she made her way back to the crumbling walls, she decided not to try to follow Brand into such places on her own again. She would make a guiding candle instead, a beacon to direct him home. Like the case of her own plight, in such places each person had to test their own resolve and could not rely on others to save them. Brand would make it home or he would not. It was his fate, and she did not have the craft to alter his destiny for him.
Chapter Seven
The Armory
Brand stood in a very different time and place than Telyn. He stared down at the axe in his hand. It was true; he was the axe’s master. But was this yet another of Oberon’s tricks? Had he been the axe’s master all along, and simply not known it? Or had the wily old elf actually done him a service? It was difficult to tell. He had asked for the ancient Oberon’s help in mastering the axe, and now he could not deny that he had mastered it. But the experience had not been as expected. It had been rather like asking a jailor to be freed and having him point out the prison door was unlocked. Brand felt the fool.
“Now, I require that my debt be paid,” Oberon told him.
Brand narrowed his eyes. He realized that if he gave up Lavatis for his debt, he then would have nothing left to bargain with to rebuild the Pact. He thought of arguing that Oberon had done nothing to help him, but he could not do so in good conscious. Possibly, Oberon’s words had served to convince him he had mastered the axe, and that was the key to it all. He doubted he would get any straight answers out of the elf concerning the matter, so he didn’t try.
“I will wager with you,” Brand said, his heart heavy as he spoke the words. “Double, or nothing at all.”
“Double?” said Oberon, immediately intrigued. “Double meaning…?” He pointed a long finger in the direction of the axe.
“No,” Brand snapped quickly. He knew he loved the axe too much now, despite what it had made him do. He could never give it up. He also knew that one couldn’t hope to win a wager with the Faerie if it wasn’t honestly made. He could never give up the axe, but….
“I will only wager what I can give,” Brand said. “I will wager my head.”
Oberon nodded, as if not in the least surprised. “Very good. And the wager itself?”
Brand thought hard. “I’ve chosen the items wagered, perhaps you could suggest an acceptable challenge,” he said at last.
Oberon looked at him then, and smiled. “Wise again,” he said. He thought for a quick moment. “I will wager that thou cannot strike through the central flagstone of this castle’s southern tower.”
“Strike through a flagstone? With the axe?” asked Brand, surprised. “I don’t know if I can do it. Won’t the axe shatter, or just bounce off?”
“That’s what I’m wondering, Axeman!” Oberon laughed and circled Brand twice. He took out his pipes and played six thrilling notes. “Hence, the excitement of the wager!”
Brand opened his mouth then closed it. Words failed him. The Fae were so strange. One moment they might be your mortal enemies, the next they may appear to be blood-brothers. But then the third moment came, when they seemed completely mad. Their natural way was to treat all of life as a game—even death could be an amusement.
Oberon circled him again and came close, putting his lips near Brand’s ear. The axe twitched at his presumption.
“Hast thou never a thought for the axe?” the elf lord whispered. “Does the mystery of it not burn thy very soul?”
“I think of little else,” Brand admitted.
“Then we shall test its edge and your strength of mind together upon a single flagstone!” proclaimed Oberon. A cheer went up from the smaller ones, who had returned and now surrounded them. “The wager is spoken and it is done!”
“It is done,” said Brand.
Oberon danced with excitement. His pipes traveled up and down the scale twice with impossible speed and precision. Brand wondered that Oberon could be so joyous while his dead daughter lay cooling at his feet. The Faerie were a strange folk, of that he was sure. Grief and joy, life and death, these things seemed so close together with them as to be one and the same.
Shouldering the axe, he followed the elf toward the southern tower. As he walked, he noted that he still held the silvery lock of the elfkin-maiden’s hair, Llewella’s hair, in his hand. Absently, he slipped it into his pocket.
Surrounded by the Shining Folk, he saw that they carried the dead body of the elfkin maiden, held high like a trophy. Of his own companions, he saw nothing. He wondered vaguely if they could see him. It was said in the old tales that those taken by the Faerie often saw the same world, but couldn’t locate the people in it. To both the taken and their families, it forever seemed as if the others had vanished from the world.
Brand soon stood in the midst of the southernmost tower. It was the one where Telyn and he had spent the night when they met the redcap.
Oberon indicated the very flagstone upon which they had lit their fire. That night now seemed a very long time ago. It was here that the redcap had stained its cap with Telyn’s blood. Brand eyed the top of the broken walls, but saw nothing of the creature. Shining Folk thronged the walls, however, reminding Brand of Riverton children watching the Harvest Moon races.
Brand eyed the flagstone and reached up to grasp the handle of the axe again. “Lavatis and my head are yours should I lose. Should I win, my debt is erased,” he said to Oberon and half to himself.
Oberon just eyed him. He cocked his head, in what Brand had learned to be the manner of the Faerie when they were curious about River Folk. It seemed that for them, once something was said, there was no need to repeat it later.
Brand flexed his fingers and reached for the axe. Around him, the gathered Faerie fell silent. All their strange eyes glittered, focused upon him and the haft of the axe.
Brand raised the axe aloft. As if it had been awaiting this moment, the axe sent a surge of pleasure through him. His face split and his teeth revealed themselves. The axe rose overhead almost by itself. The Eye of Ambros burned brightly, out-shining the moon that rode the h
eavens overhead. The warm amber light lit up the ruined tower and the encircling Faerie, and even the Shining Folk drew back from its glory. The manlings and wisps whispered in hushed tones, striking wagers of their own.
Brand no longer doubted himself or the axe. He stood squarely over the scorched flagstone and held the axe aloft in both hands. He brought it down with a single, crashing stroke.
The flagstone exploded into fragments and fell inward with a crash. A pall of dust exploded up into Brand’s face. He realized that there was a hole there, that he had broken into a hidden chamber beneath the tower. The amber light of Ambros caused things to gleam with yellowy reflections. Golden motes of dust glittered and floated around him.
“What trick is this?” demanded Brand. As the dust cleared, he made out the shapes of weapons in the chamber. Swords, pikes and crossbows filled the space beneath the tower.
“An Armory?” asked Brand. “What are you playing at, Oberon? I’ve won our wager!”
“Almost,” said Oberon quietly.
Brand looked at him then turned back to the broken flagstone. Yellow eyes glared up at him from the chamber. He knew in an instant the he was face to face with the redcap.
“Ah!” shouted Brand. “You want me to slay this foul bogey! I see your game now, and you won’t be disappointed!”
He jumped down into the dusty blackness and the very stones of the castle seemed to swallow him up.
Brand stumbled, and felt a pain that should have crippled his ankle, but it was as nothing to him. He held the axe high to light up the scene. A great number of finely-made weapons met his eyes, and the sight of them brought him pleasure. Then he saw the redcap. It had retreated to one of the racks, where it took up an ornate sword and shield. Brand recognized the black diamond on its shield: it was the mark of his clan.
Without further hesitation, Brand strode forward to strike down the redcap. It was a menace and it had harmed Telyn. It was not fit to live.
