Feynard

by Marc Secchia

  “Nothing of substance,” Kevin grunted. “Only, that it would be a terrible shame, should a land so beautiful rot and die because of something we could have prevented. This festering illness makes me very afraid–I can only imagine how you feel, being a Dryad with your rapport with the Forest. Look out there, Alliathiune! Isn’t it a splendid lighttime? And what a view! Could you not keep drinking that in, and be satisfied for a whole lifetime’s worth of sylvan beauty? See how immense is the Forest, how it cloaks the Hills in hoary garments of leafy bough and mighty, deep-rooted trees. It seems to have stood untouched since the dawn of time.”

  She made a low chuckle in response.

  “It’s hard to believe that such evil as corrupting spirits and anti-glödryan and Ozark the Dark could ever coexist with such a picturesque, peaceful land. And it seems to have healing properties, this Forest of yours; here, anything is possible. I have never enjoyed health such as I have found here–it is almost as if I have been restored molecule by molecule, for I find I have greater strength every lighttime. I can walk unaided for ages, for goodness’ sake! Sometimes I still catch myself thinking that this is a dream.”

  “I thought you were over that.”

  “I still think it from time to time, Alliathiune. Earth doesn’t have what you have here–animals don’t speak, Dryads don’t exist, and Fauns are the stuff of fairy tales.”

  “Well! I most certainly do exist–”

  “I submit!” he cried at once, laughing. “If nothing else, that slap you gave me certainly convinced me you were real! It hurt too much not to be.”

  “You deserved it.”

  “Gosh, don’t go overboard with the sympathy, Alliathiune.” She reached out and mussed his curls, which was something Kevin used to hate–but now, he could only muster a half-snarl. It was somehow different when she did it. “Stop that!”

  She giggled merrily. “You’re such an old fusspot sometimes. You’re worse than Zephyr.”

  “Put wings on you and you’d just be a nisk fly,” he retorted.

  “Kevin!”

  Her fingers had become tangled in his curls. She tugged absently this way and that, but Kevin did not mind the pain. “Far from it, of course,” he soothed.

  “You are much changed from that outlander who first arrived in Thaharria-brin-Tomal, good Kevin. Daily, you become more the warrior of my dreams.”

  “I’m no warrior!”

  “Well, lord mighty high whatnot the wizard, then.” She turned to him, and then looked away just as quickly with a troubled frown. “Look, this isn’t easy for me to say …”

  “I’m just glad you’re well again–friend.”

  He sought by this reference to draw her back to a previous conversation they had enjoyed, but Alliathiune only sighed and looked the more pensive. Her hand grew still but remained tangled in his hair. At length she said, “Good Kevin, do you recall how we Dryads function to protect the forests and woodlands of the Seventy-Seven Hills?” He nodded. “How we care for living things, and heal and nurture? The Blight is far worse for Dryads than for many of the other creatures. We are more closely tied to the Forest’s wellbeing. I don’t know quite how to put this, but I’ll say it anyway–in the past, men with wizardly powers have always done our Forest harm, not good. Humans have never stood for right and justice and truth, and their wizards have been the worst of all. Not that I think you’re a bad person! I’m not making much sense.”

  “More than enough for me.”

  “No, I didn’t mean it that way!” Alliathiune took a deep breath and pulled her hand free, leaving him feeling bereft of her touch. Exactly when had her touch, her presence, come to mean so much to him? “Look, Zephyr’s the learned one in this company. If he thinks you’d make a wizard, as you shared with me, then I have no doubts. Human wizards are very few in number, good Kevin. Historically they have always risen more easily through the wizardly ranks–perhaps through some little-understood natural aptitude–but they have always, in the end, succumbed to whatever evil temptation or lust afflicts people with such powers. Your powers are mighty. I wouldn’t want to see you hurt by taking that scroll the good Unicorn offered you, and becoming the next Ozark the Dark.”

  “He must have his reasons,” Kevin said, profoundly disturbed by her words. “I’d like to think about that, uh … alone, if you don’t mind.”

  The Dryad apologised awkwardly and moved away to converse with Snatcher.

  Tomorrow they would reach Elliadora’s Well. What would they find there? Was Alliathiune concerned for him, or for the Forest, or for another reason altogether? Kevin’s feelings of hurt and rejection won out. Had it been Zephyr or Snatcher, he decided, he would not have felt such a sharp pang. But he knew Alliathiune cared about him, or at least, about his fate in relation to his ability to serve the Forest. Was she seeking to manipulate him through their nascent friendship? “You are vulnerable, Kevin, both to her allure and to her magic,” he muttered. “Never forget the extent of her otherworldly powers.” His eyebrows drew together.

  It was not far-fetched–perhaps less so than the attendant questions about Zephyr’s offer. If Human wizards were few, and susceptible to unknown, dark temptations, then for what reason would the Unicorn risk raising another enemy of the Forest? Was he that desperate? Or did he truly believe Kevin had it within him to be a wizard?

  “Fat ruddy chance, old man,” he grunted. “Poor Kevin, having passed the seven mysterious tests, is miraculously imbued with godlike powers to shape the fate of entire realms? That’s worse than wishful thinking. What would you do with the power anyway?”

  As his gaze lit upon the rushing headwaters of the Barlindran river, not a stone’s throw to his left, Kevin was left to consider the unpleasant notion that the Unicorn’s motives might not be entirely transparent after all.

  * * * *

  When Kevin returned for waycrust, he heard the Faun mutter that this was the last of their provisions, so he had better chew slowly. Alliathiune and Zephyr were deep in conversation beside the small fire, close enough for him to overhear. The Lurk had disappeared to find a wet spot to cool his hide.

  “It came to me as if in a dream this last darktime,” Alliathiune said to the Unicorn, in reply to a question Kevin had missed. “Have I spoken to you before about the spiritual aspects of this journey for me?”

  “Before departing Thaharria-brin-Tomal, good Dryad,” said Zephyr, “you did express your eagerness to lay eyes on the Sacred Grove. You said that no living Dryad had visited there. And I understand its importance to your kind.”

  She nodded, her hazel eyes not missing Kevin’s attentive posture. He coloured, but did not move. She said, “I have come to appreciate that it is deeper and more significant than that, good Unicorn. My heart is lifted with wondrous emotion. This is a homecoming. Perhaps I hope to discover something of myself here, something of my true nature and purpose. There is nothing logical about this extraordinary hope that blossoms within me.”

  “Logic is overrated.”

  “You cynic. Do I not detect a spring in your step?”

  “Doubtless,” Zephyr admitted, “even if my ties with the Mother Forest are less profound. The Well is the heart of our Forest. There is no greater magic. I think that when you journey to the heart, you begin to discover things about yourself, perhaps through reflection or conversation, that you have not known before. Even in this company I have discovered a treasure–greater than being a team, united in our mission, or braving dangers together.”

  “Indeed, I feel the same.”

  “I do not discount these things. But as you have intimated, good Alliathiune, I sense a deeper meaning that I cannot quantify, though it is as it were on the tip of my horn. I have come to know an inner peace in and of myself, and in my relations with others, that transcends understanding. It is like stepping into a stream and being bathed in cool waters. And yet even this image is inaccurate, for it seems to come from without and within in equal measure. This I cannot fathom. I would not
have used the word ‘spiritual’, but upon reflection, I find it strangely apt.”

  Alliathiune’s enigmatic smile made him harrumph in good-natured discontent. “I know we Unicorns are the most reason-bound of creatures, eschewing the religious pretensions of Driadorn’s other creatures. Yet this was not always so. In olden times, Unicorns too had religious beliefs and a common mythology, but these were lost and discarded over the course of thousands of seasons. I fear something has been lost that may never be regained.”

  “And therein lies a life’s labour.”

  Zephyr’s eyes lidded over, but his voice became unconsciously resonant. “Indeed, good Dryad, therein lies a labour of love.”

  And the Unicorn drifted off to crop a tasty-looking tuft of grass. But he declared it Blighted, and moved on.

  Kevin tried to create a tiny reading light, as Zephyr had shown him. “Pesky thing,” he muttered after a while, extinguishing it for the twentieth time.

  “I’ll ask Zephyr for you,” said Alliathiune, ruffling his curls as she passed by unexpectedly.

  Much later, the outlander fell asleep with a smile still fixed to his lips.

  * * * *

  Dawn found the company hot on the trail leading to Elliadora’s Well. Neither Zephyr nor Alliathiune had been able to sleep because of the excitement, and their bickering soon roused the rest of the company. Presently, to the melodious accompaniment of a cheerful flock of lime-green parakeets, they were negotiating the steepest slopes yet, making for a ridge that Zephyr insisted was the Well itself. Here the Barlindran flung itself headlong over a series of rocky steps, which made the waters roar and foam in spectacular turbulence.

  In the distance, Kevin saw another river cascading down from the heights, which his limited knowledge of the local geography placed as the Rhiallandran. Somewhere, hidden from sight about that central massif, he assumed, must lie the headwaters of the other five major rivers of this region. But they stuck to the banks of the Barlindran River, and travelled for the most part in silence, even reverence. For some innate quality of their surroundings bespoke the ancient and the awesome, and the beauty of the soft, rolling Forest behind and the magnificent waterfalls before fair took one’s breath away. And soon, coming to the thousand-foot plume that marked the Barlindran’s tumultuous plunge from the Well’s heights, they crossed behind the flow by a natural pathway to a grassy meadow beyond, which lay between the two rivers like a bird nestled amongst branches. In the middle distance a perfect circle of seven majestic trees dominated the meadow. Deep-rooted they were in the sward, deep and primeval and strong, and the branches of their crowns stretched as if in praise to the heavens above.

  Kevin craned his neck. Why, those trees were seven or eight hundred feet tall if they were an inch! It had to be magic. Seven they were, but about two-thirds of the way up their soaring height the branches intertwined, giving rise to a single, almighty crown.

  At this sight, Alliathiune knelt and kissed the grass. Tears ran down her nose and streaked her cheeks, but she gave them no heed. “We have arrived,” she said simply. “This is the Sacred Grove of the Dryads, our most holy place. And these trees are the Elliarana, the very spirit of Elliadora herself, planted at the very dawn of the Forest. This is my dream come true.”

  Laughing in childlike abandon, she began to dance upon the sward, her long hair rippling like blown silk with every joyous toss of her head and twirl of her body. Finally, chuckling and panting from breathlessness and elation, she collapsed in a heap amongst the snowdrops and wildflowers and giggled at the sky. Zephyr clucked disapprovingly under his breath, clearly feeling that there was little time to waste on such frivolous behaviour when the fate of the Forest was at stake. Snatcher sat on the ground and picked a burr out from between his toes.

  “Look, Zephyr,” said Kevin, pointing. “Steps leading upwards–and an archway. Is that the way to the Well itself?”

  “That, good outlander, is the fabled Arch of Driadorn,” said the Unicorn, in a bored monotone. “The chronicles tell of how blessed Elliadora, Firstborn of the Magi, came to Feynard in the wake of a great catastrophe–a devastating war of the Gods which blasted and poisoned the land so severely that no green thing would grow, nor bird would nest, nor animal burrow. Having planted and tended the seeds that would become the Forest, she did contrive to raise the waters of the seven rivers to nourish what she had planted. And she built the arch to symbolise the perfection of harmony between the skies above and the land beneath, and to symbolically guard the entry to Elliadora’s Well itself. It is said that once upon a time the Dragons did guard this arch with their fiery breath and great magic, but those lighttimes long precede the ambit of mortal memory. Too, there is a legend amongst Dryads,” and the Unicorn lowered his voice so that Kevin alone could hear him, “that there beneath the Arch of Driadorn Elliadora lay with her lover Indomalion, and in the mingling of their seed gave naissance to the race of Dryads.”

  “Indomalion of the secondary sun?” Kevin whispered.

  “One and the same. Beneath the arch, legend has it, is the only place in all the Forest, and indeed all Feynard, where a Dryad may mate with mortal man.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense. How do they … reproduce?”

  Zephyr shook his mane soberly. “Another Dryad secret, good Kevin. Many are their secrets! I do wonder if this tale of the Arch of Driadorn is merely another myth.”

  “The Well itself was the pinnacle of Elliadora’s creative work, and also the place where she spilled her life in defence of the Hills. For in those lighttimes, mighty were the gods that dwelled in the cold places between the stars, and foremost amongst their brethren was Kruall, also called Kruall the Covetous. Kruall was half-brother to Elliadora, but was born with none of the graces that marked his siblings. He was surpassingly beautiful to look upon, but ugly and twisted inside. Whatever they had, he lusted after, and whatever was precious to them he craved more than life itself. Scheming and whining and conniving marked his younger years, and he enjoyed nothing more than to spoil the plans and pleasures of his siblings and half-siblings. Thus it was that when he laid his greedy eyes upon the flowering splendour of Driadorn and remembered how he had incited its wizards to war, Kruall was moved to a furious rage. He swept down upon the Hills in the full panoply of his majestic wrath. Striking the land a dreadful blow, he opened the Küshar Ravine, broke the back of the Yalkê-na-Têk ridge, and spilled Mistral Bog into what had before been the lush lowlands of Tanmêra-Loymê. From there he came to the Well, where he fought with Elliadora a mighty and dreadful battle, which grievously wounded them both. As Kruall retreated to lick his wounds, Elliadora was borne by the Dryads to that place where now stands the Sacred Grove, and there in the arms of Indomalion, her beloved, she did perish. It is said that in the instant of death, her spirit infused those seven trees. The Dryads say you can hear her still, if you stand in the centre of the Grove.”

  Kevin sighed. “It’s a tragic tale. But, what happened to Indomalion and Kruall?”

  “Indomalion,” said he, “did pursue Kruall to the edge of the Rhiallandran River, where he slew him like a wretched dog and cast him into the waters to be devoured by the fish that swim and the crabs that scuttle. Though many were the lighttimes Indomalion lived upon the Hills, and mighty were the works of love and justice wrought by his right hand, yet always did Indomalion return to this place to grieve for his lost love. They say also that the flowers on this meadow are the tears of Indomalion scattered in the seasons of his grief.”

  Akê-Akê gave a derisive snort. “One would expect such a tale of the Dryads.”

  “What sort of tale?” Alliathiune inquired, in dangerously honeyed tones.

  “I was telling Kevin the tale of Elliadora and Indomalion,” said Zephyr, spotting trouble at once. “We should move on, while this lighttime is yet young.”

  And Alliathiune and Akê-Akê flew into an argument.

  Snatcher rolled his eyes at Kevin, and ushered him away with a heavy paw laid up
on his shoulder. “Mark not their heated words,” said he. “When so much hot air passes between these folk, they forget what has been said not a turn later.”

  Kevin smiled wanly, grateful for the Lurk’s understanding. “I just hate arguments,” he said. “Father used to shout when he got drunk. And the shouting always led to a beating. It twists me up inside–even now.”

  “You’ve nought to fear from our companions,” said Snatcher, giving them a backward glance. “Even our allegedly primitive Faun has become remarkably tame around you.”

  “If you say so, Snatcher.”

  “Come, we shall be first to the Well.”

  They passed between the pillars of that perfect white arch–constructed of marble and magic, the Lurk told him–and set boots and paws respectively to the hewn-stone steps. The sounds of argument faded behind them. Soon, Kevin was able to peek fearfully down at the Sacred Grove, which from his modest elevation revealed a white circle in the precise centre of the heptagon formed by the trees, and when he pointed it out, the Lurk explained that its origin was lost in the mists of time, but that the Dryads had once placed upon it their tribute to Elliadora. There were two places where the magic of the Forest was most concentrated, he added–the waters of Elliadora’s Well itself, and down there between the trees of the Grove. As Kevin peeked again, keeping his hands and back firmly against bare rock and willing down a sudden lurch of vertigo, he saw Zephyr, Akê-Akê and Alliathiune following with several of the X’gäthi in tow, and two of their number standing guard in the shadows of the Arch of Driadorn. From halfway up, they appeared as tiny insects, save the distinctive Unicorn. Consternation showed in their movements and pointing–did they perceive some danger? He was about to warn Snatcher, when his mouth dropped open. Zephyr was levitating his group up the side of the mountain!

  Kevin’s face turned crimson with chagrin. Even the Lurk blinked several times, startled by the Unicorn’s unexpected display of power. Then, what could only be a mischievous grin split his gnarled face from ear to ear.