by B. V. Larson
Jak had been carried aloft to rest in the spare bedroom. Brand found that he could eat on the kitchen table that had only hours before seen desperate surgery. Brand and Corbin ate like famished men, as did Tylag and Corbin’s brothers, who had returned from the ferry at the base of the cliff to eat.
Tylag was full of ill tidings. “We’ve been busy all morning. It seems that everyone is leaving the island. The word is that the Rabing Clan broke the Pact and have brought a curse upon all the River Folk.”
“That’s ridiculous!” shouted Telyn. “Who says such things?”
Tylag spooned up a load of steaming mussels. “The Hoots and the Silures are at the bottom of it, I expect. But all the folk are scared, and at such a time they will say things they may come to regret. But there is no doubt that the Faerie are no longer protecting our borders from the Dark Ones among them. All of us should move with caution. No one of this clan should be alone after dark.”
After the others had promised to follow his advice in this matter he made another announcement. “Tonight Suzenna and I go to a closed council meeting at Drake manor. There is talk of a muster.”
Everyone looked up at that. “Are things as bad as all that?” asked Corbin’s oldest brother Barlo. “Surely, the rift with the Faerie can be repaired.”
“That’s as may be, but we must prepare for the worst,” said Tylag. “No one knows what twilight may bring.”
“But a muster?” burst out Barlo. “What’s wrong with the Riverton Constabulary? They have always served us well enough. Let them mount a watch with archers upon the fairy mound and feather the little devils when they come!”
Aunt Suzenna stood up, and everyone turned to her, all thinking of what a muster could mean—and that she had three sons and no daughters. She looked at them sternly. “If there is to be a muster, all my sons shall go, or Clan Rabing will truly be disgraced.”
Barlo could not meet her eyes. He said no more of the Riverton Constabulary. Talk shifted to the unusually cold weather and preparations that they should make to defend the household. Tylag announced he would lock the doors tonight, both front and rear. The boys discussed building an outer fence to circle the homestead during the following weeks. Telyn talked of gathering wards for the lot of them.
Brand noticed that Modi and Gudrin said little. At one point, however, he believed that he saw them exchange glances. He thought to see regret and perhaps a touch of sadness in their eyes. This disturbed him and he left the table early, his head full of thoughts of the coming nights and what they might hold. He didn’t think that Tylag and the others had a realistic idea of what they were facing.
The afternoon passed swiftly. Twilight came all too soon for Brand’s taste. Each day grew shorter with the approach of winter, he knew, but tonight darkness seemed to fall with great suddenness, as if a cloak had been cast over the eyes of the land. Tylag and Suzenna had long since gone to Drake Manor for the council meeting, taking Corbin’s brother Barlo with them. Sam was out using his thick arms to split wood and dragging his lame foot about as they tended the livestock, while Corbin and Brand played Jiggers and Swap-Cards in the parlor. All three of them were content, however, as Sam liked nothing more than to work his body, while the younger boys liked nothing more than competing with their minds. Upstairs, Gudrin and Telyn tended Jak in the spare bedroom, while Modi haunted the upstairs hallway. By the groaning of the floorboards overhead, it was easy for Brand to track his pacing.
“Modi seems anxious to be away,” said Corbin in a low voice. “I wonder how much they know about what will happen here in the River Haven.”
“I don’t know,” sighed Brand. He was in a reflective mood. All around him were sights and sounds that were among his favorite in the world. He had played in this parlor as a child. He and Corbin had often bounced themselves upon the couches until they were discovered by Aunt Suzenna and chased from the house. Along the walls was a shelf containing a row of perhaps thirty books, each of which that he had read at least twice. A painting of his mother and father, one of only three that still existed, hung from the wall behind Corbin’s head. He felt his eye drawn to his mother’s image. Tall and sleek she was, with flaxen hair and a mouth that ever curved into a smile. Jak more resembled her, while he more resembled his father. Holding to the tiller of their boat in the painting, his father was dark-haired with a heavy mustache. His eyes were stern and he smiled little.
“Do you really want to play?” asked Corbin softly.
Brand dealt the cards without interest. “Perhaps we should post a lookout,” he suggested. “The night is black and the moon has yet to rise.”
Corbin shrugged. “Tylag locked the door and Sam is out in the barn. Surely, he will serve as a good lookout until he gets back.”
Brand agreed, and played out his hand. When he had lost three hands in a row he conceded the night to Corbin. Thinking of Modi and his lessons today with the woodaxe, he went to the woodshed that adjoined the kitchen and fetched one. Returning to the parlor, he sat with a cloth and whetstone and worked the edge of the blade.
“Don’t let my mother catch you with that in her parlor,” was all Corbin said as he packed away the cards, the betting beads and the jigger-sticks.
“I just wanted to work out the nicks that we put into the blade this morning—” Brand broke off when they heard a shout from outside.
“That’s Sam,” said Corbin.
“Sounds like he’s in trouble, let’s go.”
The two of them ran outside, Brand still carrying the woodaxe. The big doors were hanging open, and the sheep were crying in their pens nearby. The barn was dark; there was no outward sign of Sam or his lantern. After the one, brief shout, they heard nothing more from Sam. Corbin stood in the entrance and called for his brother.
“I’ll light a lantern,” said Brand. He handed the woodaxe to Corbin and took down a lantern from its peg.
Corbin walked away into the darkness, shouting for Sam. Brand burnt his fingers getting the lantern to sputter into life. Sucking on them, he stepped after Corbin in the lantern’s flickering circle of yellow light.
“Get out of here!” shouted Corbin suddenly, swinging the axe with great force. An old wooden stool exploded beneath the blow. Brand saw something bound away and clamber up the haystack. He got a better look at the thing when it crested the mountain of hay and stood at its peak, looking down at them. Brand marveled at the lightness of the creature. It did not sink into the hay at all.
There could be no doubt that it was one of the Wee Folk. The manling was male and stood about two feet tall. He had a thin face with sharp features: the nose was like a blade and the chin tapered to a point. The overlarge mouth was stretched into a perpetual grin. Brand examined the tiny clothing in wonder. Tight-fitting hose covered thin legs and the feet wore pointed boots. The boots and his russet-brown waistcoat seemed to be made of doeskin. All the clothing seemed woven with impossibly fine workmanship, each stitch smaller than any human tailor could produce. The manling leered at them and rested his overlarge hands on his bent knees.
“Where’s my brother!” shouted Corbin, threatening the creature with the axe.
“He’s in several places!” said the manling in his piping voice. This reply seemed to greatly amuse him. He wrapped his thin long arms about himself and shook with laughter.
Corbin moved to swing at the manling, but Brand reached out to stop him.
“At least he’s talking to us,” Brand told his cousin. He turned back to the manling. “I’ve spoken with your lord, Oberon. He has helped me, so you must do the same.”
At this the manling’s eyes narrowed. His eyeballs were glass-like beads the color of flint. His grin took on the aspect of an evil leer. “Oberon has been deposed, so his words have no weight.”
“You serve a new lord then?”
The manling shook his head. “The new lord is even less to my liking.”
“Are you still loyal to Oberon then?”
The manling looked abo
ut the barn, as if seeing things invisible to the two men. Which perhaps he did, reflected Brand.
He appeared to come to a decision. He bent forward conspiratorially. “I speak for Oberon. He would bid thee to run from this place, man-child.”
“Why? Where should I go?” asked Brand, stepping forward and lifting his lantern higher.
The manling squinted into the yellow light. “Join the Kindred, help them find Myrrdin and learn what must be done. The Wanderer will explain matters.”
Brand nodded. “Thanks for the advice. Can I call the Wee Folk friends?”
The manling’s face grew sorrowful then, he shook his tiny head and tsked at them. “Ever it is so with thy folk,” he sighed. His face grew long and mournful. A hint of his true age showed in his cheeks then, which grew new wrinkles, and his bright, black eyes, which dimmed. “Ever thou wouldst mistake the slightest aid for friendship. True friendship is something which must be earned and which is never given. So big thy kind growns, yet thou hast the minds of children.”
Still making tsking sounds, he bent down and began brushing away the straw at his feet. Brand watched in confusion as he cleared away the yellow straw from what appeared to be a patch of dark fur. The manling glanced at them, and tsked further at their incomprehension. With a sudden sweeping movement and a puff of breath blown through his thin fingers he revealed what was hidden in the haystack.
It was Sam’s head.
Chapter Fifteen
Dando
Sam’s head had been severed at the neck. The eyes were open and staring, the mouth sagged. The manling was standing atop the head, the dark fur that flipped and curled over his pointed shoes was Sam’s hair.
Shock froze the two men. The manling watched them with keen interest. Brand felt disconnected from the real world at that moment. It couldn’t be that Sam was dead, but his cousin’s severed head was undeniable proof. He looked at the manling, and wondered what alien thoughts were in that tiny creature’s mind. He seemed very curious at their response, as if he were studying them. Perhaps, for the manling, human grief was a mystery.
Corbin was the first to come to life. Without a word, he stepped forward and made a sweeping cut with his woodaxe at the manling. The manling, ready for such a response, bounded straight up into the air and did a complete spin as he came down, landing again on his gruesome perch. Corbin swung again, and this time the manling performed another impossible leap, bounding up into the hayloft overhead. Brand came to life as the manling flew over their heads and he snatched up a pitchfork. Grimly, not speaking, the two of them clambered up the shaky, steep steps to the loft. Corbin reached the top first and he made a soft sighing sound and fell to his knees. Brand rushed to him, wondering if he had been stricken. He followed his cousin’s gaze and found himself staring at the rest of Sam. The headless body, looking oddly incomplete, lay at the edge of the loft. Clearly, the head had been lopped off and had tumbled out of the loft to fall on the haystack.
“Look, he took one with him!” said Brand grimly. He pointed to Sam’s thick-fingered hands. In the grip of his dead hands was the dark, furred neck of what could only have been a rhinog. The rhinog was dead, its neck broken.
“Sam must have surprised it in the barn,” said Brand aloud.
They became aware of a scrabbling sound. The manling was trying to pry back a loose board and escape the barn. Corbin rose swiftly and advanced in a crouch. He held his axe at the ready. There was a low growling sound emanating from his throat.
The manling looked up in alarm. “I didn’t do it!” he squeaked. “It was the goblins and their rhinog offspring! They follow the Dark Bard! He is in the bogs even now! We must flee him!”
Corbin continued his advance and the creature fled with great flying bounds, like those of a hare when a fox’s teeth are right behind it. He darted beneath a pile of wooden crates. Corbin demolished them with heavy blows of the axe.
Shrieking, the Wee One bounded about, circling the loft. Corbin slashed about with the axe in wild abandon. Brand made a calculated thrust with his pitchfork and managed to catch the creature’s deerskin boot, pinning it to the rough wood of the loft.
Corbin roared in triumph. The manling shrieked in terror and struggled to free himself.
“Wait, Corbin!” shouted Brand. “Don’t kill him! We need answers!”
For a moment Brand feared he had not gotten through to his cousin, who was no longer acting like the boy he had grown up with. His wrath was something terrible to behold. Brand felt that he understood that uncontrollable fury. It was the same feeling that had gotten him through the previous night and allowed him to save Jak. He understood that Corbin was beyond reason, and may well kill the manling in his grief, though he had not committed the crime.
The axe descended, and the manling cried in fear. The blade thunked into the old planks of the loft, making the timbers shudder. Corbin had spared the creature.
“Do not play with our grief, manling,” Corbin told the quivering creature. He jabbed a finger into the manling’s side.
A dark look crossed the manling’s sharp features, and Brand thought that he hungered to play a trick on them, perhaps thinking to singe Corbin’s finger or turn the offending nail black and rotten. But he didn’t dare.
“Now we shall have some quick answers,” said Brand, squatting and setting down the lantern.
“Ever it is with River Folk,” said the manling. “Always blaming the messenger for bad tidings.”
“Tell us your name,” demanded Brand.
The creature paused and looked as if he were about to fabricate a name. Brand moved the lantern very close to him, so that the heat of the fire inside could easily be felt. The manling shrank away in discomfort.
“I am Dando.”
“Where are the rhinogs that did this?” demanded Corbin.
“Outside, in the forest, in the bog, wherever their masters lead them.”
“They are led by goblins?”
“Of course. Rhinogs will only follow their sires.”
“How many of them are there?”
Dando shrugged his small shoulders. “Three goblins have brought their broods. They each have ten or so offspring with them.”
Brand frowned. “The goblins have so many human women to breed such numbers of rhinogs? Don’t the rhinogs have families of their own?”
Dando looked at him as if he were a fool. “Rhinogs are mules, boy. As to the prolific qualities of goblins, they are legendary. It is not uncommon for a birthmother to gestate six spratling rhinogs at a time.”
“What a hellish life those poor wretches must lead,” said Brand.
“We must do something for Sam,” said Corbin.
Brand turned to him. “We will, cousin, but first we need to know what we face.” To Dando he said, “Since the people of the River Haven have long been off limits I suppose that most of the women have been taken from the wagons of the Wandering Folk.”
Dando nodded. Brand noted that now that the manling was forced to answer, he was speaking quite openly. He seemed to be enjoying the interrogation, as would the town gossip. What strange creatures were the Faerie.
“Why do they plague us, manling?” asked Brand.
“Ah, good question!” said Dando. His eyes shone with the reflected glow of the moon. His broad smile revealed many white teeth. “Why indeed? I’ll tell thee this: they hunt for something lost, and care not one whit for thee nor any others of the River Folk.”
“Enough of this!” growled Corbin. “We must get back to the house.”
“Hold, cousin,” urged Brand. “So, what is their next move? If there are thirty or forty of them, why doesn’t Voynod just lead them against us and burn us out now?”
Dando laughed, some of the swagger returning to his manner now that it was clear that they were not going to kill him out of hand. “That is not the way of the goblins. They are raiders by nature. They value their offspring and would rather isolate and kill thee one at a time without endangering t
hemselves.”
“So we would be the next easy prey, as we are out here on our own,” said Brand. He glanced at Corbin, but his cousin was no longer listening. The shock of his brother’s death had glazed over his eyes.
There came a sound from outside then. It was a splashing, slapping sound, such as large, flat feet would make in the bog. Then came a human cry, a high-pitched one, like that of a child or a young woman in trouble.
Corbin and Brand rose, taking up the lantern and the woodaxe again. Brand looked down at the manling, who was furiously tugging at his pinned foot.
“Before you go, Dando, tell us what we hear outside.”
“It’s a goblin trick, fool man-child! Hast thou not heard their mocking voices before?” he hissed. “Now free me!”
Brand eased up the pitchfork, and Dando sprang free. He bounded to the edge of the loft, and then glanced back over his shoulder. “Remember, if thy fate is to survive the night, find Myrrdin!” he cried, then sprang out into space. Brand watched him sprint down the far side of the haystack and out the door.
He paused at the doorway and there was a blinding flash of blue light. Where the manling had stood a large barn owl now hopped into the air and took flight. On silent wings it vanished into the night.
“The owl,” said Corbin. “Was that the bird you saw at your window two nights ago? Has that changeling been haunting our barn for weeks?”
“Forget it,” said Brand. “We have to run for the house!”
“What about Sam?”
Brand squeezed his shoulder. “We will have to do what we can for him in the morning.”
Corbin nodded grimly and followed Brand down out of the loft. They left the lantern in the loft so that it might appear that they were still there. Signaling each other with gestures, Corbin took Brand to a small side door that led into a toolshed. Moving carefully, they opened the creaking door an inch or so to peer outside. When their eyes had adjusted to the starlight, they could see that dark shapes crept about the foundations of the house. Now and then one of the creatures would raise itself to a window and take a quick, furtive look inside.
