Once Upon a Winter's Night fs-1

by Dennis L McKiernan

  Long did she look, but at last, unable to resist, Camille leaned over to kiss his sweet lips, and as she did so, a great blob of hot wax spilled from the hollow of the fat candle stub and splashed onto Alain’s bare chest, and he bolted upright and looked at her in horror. “Oh my love, what have you-? What have you done? The curse, the geas. Now I must-” But his words were chopped off, and there came the moan of a great wind rushing throughout the manor, a wind filled with screams of the living, a wind filled with screams of the damned. A churning darkness came over Alain, as of shadows alive swirling all about his form, and within the dimness his shape began to change, to alter. Camille stumbled up from the bed and hindward, her own mouth gaping wide in shock. And the raging wind shrieked along the halls and hammered upon the doors, the very walls shuddering under the thunderous blows. And all about Alain, blackness swirled, and then he was gone, the huge brown Bear now in his place. And he roared in rage, and Camille reeled back, a soundless scream trapped in her throat. His ashen eyes mad with fury, the Bear rose up and raised a massive claw as if to strike her. Camille shrilled in terror and cowered down, throwing up an arm in futile protection, the candle falling from her grasp to roll and lie on its side. In the flickering shadows the Bear loomed above her, his deafening roars bellowing out over the howl of the wind, and in that moment Camille knew that she was going to die at his claws, just as had the Redcap Goblins. But then the Bear turned and dropped to all fours and crashed out through the door, and the howl of the wind yawled as if in victory, the wails within shrilling in terror. The shrieking wind rose in screaming crescendo, up and up and — Of a sudden the terrible wind vanished and a profound silence fell as the candle guttered and went out, leaving nought but blackness and weeping Camille trembling in the still room behind.

  17

  Desolation

  Yet weeping in the darkness, Camille fumbled her way to the mantel, to find the lantern there and a striker. A yellow glow illuminated the sleeping chamber, the bed curtains torn where the Bear had ripped his way free, the satin covers ajumble.

  Sobbing and barefooted and in nought but a negligee, Camille stumbled across the broken-down door and into the corridor beyond, and there she found more wreckage: hallway and alcove furniture lay atumble; plants were overturned, their pots shattered and dirt strewn along the passage; tapestries lay where they had been ripped from the walls, along with paintings, frames broken and lying askew.

  “Lanval!” she cried out amid the wrack as she made her unsteady way along the hall. Down a stairwell she went, only to find devastation there, too.

  A profound silence filled the manor.

  “Lanval! Blanche!”

  No one answered, the stillness oppressive, broken only by her anguished cries of distress. On into the darkness she struggled, lanternlight revealing nought but ruin.

  “Lanval! Blanche! Anyone!”

  Camille began to run, and as she ran she called out for someone to answer, someone to be alive in the ruin, and everywhere she went, every room she burst into, every corridor she fled down, every hall and chamber she entered, there was nought but total disarray, terrible damage done by the terrible wind that had howled throughout the manor:

  Chairs were overturned; tables displaced; pottery smashed-wreckage and litter and shatter.

  Books and papers and pamphlets and journals were strewn about the great library, and many of the freestanding shelves had toppled, their volumes and tomes and manuscripts and scrolls flung wide.

  In the large kitchen, pots and pans were scattered, some dented nearly beyond recognition, and dishes and cups, bowls and saucers and platters were smashed, shards of porcelain and glass cutting into Camille’s bare feet as she stumbled through, and she left bloody tracks in her wake as she ran onward, calling out for someone to answer.

  Like webs of strange spiders, yards of cloth and yarn and thread draped about the sewing chamber, though most was on the floor. Baskets were smashed, and tambours lay broken, some yet clinging to remnants of embroidered scenes.

  The game room was in a shambles, with the taroc cards and dames and echecs sets strewn, and the portraits of Lord Valeray and Lady Saissa lay up against overturned tables. Camille wept to see such ruin in that special place she had come to love, and though she did not right the whole of the chamber, she did rehang the portraits.

  And everywhere, candles were smashed, as well as lanterns, the oil running to pool, or to soak into precious carpets.

  But nowhere did Camille find anyone: no Lanval, no Blanche, no Jules, no Renaud, no Andre, no Cook, no seamstresses, no footmen, no member whatsoever of the household staff. And certainly no Alain, not even as the Bear.

  The entire manor was utterly deserted of everyone but Camille.

  She was alone in the shards of her own doing.

  She was alone amid the wrack.

  She was completely alone.

  Completely.

  Alone.

  It was as if the wind itself had Camille gasped in revelation and burst into tears anew, for running through her mind, running through her mind, running again and again- The screams. The screams. All those I love, those I love, the wind, the screams, the raging wind, oh Alain, gone, all gone, carried off by the wind.

  And I did not go with them.

  The screams.

  The wind.

  Dawn came.

  But Camille did not see it.

  Exhausted by grief, by guilt, by ruin, she had fallen asleep upon her own bed amid the wrack of her suite. But even in sleep she now and again sobbed, though tears failed to come, for they were exhausted as well.

  The sun rode up in the sky, finally to shine down through the shattered skylight above. A breeze gently blew, and it set the ruin of the skylight shade to swaying. tick… tck… clk…

  “Alain!” she cried, starting up, not knowing where she was. Not knowing what had awakened her. tck… clk…

  And then she saw the wreckage, and memory came crashing in.

  For three days Camille lived in the ruin of the manor, and much of those three days she spent cleaning, sweeping, uprighting, straightening, and other such onerous chores. But the mansion was vast, and she could only deal with a small part of the whole, yet it gave her something to do while she tried to decide her course. The silence was oppressive, though now and again something sounded: a creak of settling, a pop of a beam, a clatter of some precariously balanced thing finally falling, and other such noises. And at every sound, Camille would run to see if someone, anyone, had returned or had come to call, yet no one was ever there.

  Perhaps I should go to the Autumnwood and find Liaze, or to the Winter- or Springwood, where Borel lives, or Celeste. They would know what to do. But I know not where within their demesnes they dwell. And, oh, the Winterwood is cursed, at least a part of it, where dreadful things do lurk.

  Should I instead try to make my way home, make my way back to Papa’s mansion? But once there, then what? Wait for Alain to appear? Wait in a place where Maman and Lisette would do all they could to make my life wretched. And, oh my, if Alain does not come, the tithe of gold will stop, and Papa will lose the mansion, and poor Giles will fall into ill health again.-No. I did this thing, and I will do all to set everything to rights.

  It was as she was straightening Alain’s suite that she came across a grey mask, and as she held it, only then did she realize Oh, but what a fool I have been. Alain’s eyes and those of the Bear are the same ashen shade of grey. I should have guessed. I should have known. One was never about when the other-Camille, you were and are an utter imbecile! And as you once thought, the man on the ridge with Olot the Troll that terrible night in the Winterwood: that had to have been Alain! What did Olot say just before he and the Bear went to the ridge? “Hear me, then, Bear: you spurned my daughter, and you refuse to yield this tasty morsel to me. I have you in my power, just as did my child, and as she has done, so will I do.” Surely that meant his daughter had laid a spell upon Alain, for he was already a Bear when O
lot set his own bane; hence, it must have been the daughter who cursed him so.-Oh, Mithras, now I recall more of Olot’s wind-borne words of that terrible Winterwood night: “… she will fail, and then the geas…” Those words could only mean that I would fail, that I would seek to see Alain’s face, and should I ever do so Camille burst into tears. Furiously she went about straightening Alain’s chambers, her thoughts awhirl.

  I am the one who brought about this ruin. Oh, but why didn’t Alain ever tell me? Then I wouldn’t have-Camille, you ninny, he couldn’t tell you, else the curse would have struck regardless. That’s why the mages and seers and sorcerers and witches were here at Summerwood Manor. To break the Trolls’ two curses, and Of a sudden, dread filled Camille’s heart. With Alain gone, the Bear gone, everyone gone, the Troll is free to come after me. I must decide what to do and be away from here.

  Camille began assembling a travelling kit: a waterskin and a bedroll came first, each fitted with a sling. Then into a rucksack she packed spare clothes, some dry food, some salt and pepper and additional seasonings, a cooking pot, flint and steel and tinder, soap, raggings, a tiny lantern, and other such necessities.

  I shall find Liaze, and then we will get Borel and Celeste, and then… and then… — Then what?

  Camille frowned in concentration. Then what? Then what? Then what will we do? What can we do?

  As she took up a small bronze knife-like the ones she had given Papa and Giles-she paused and looked at it, and opened and closed the blade.

  Ah, then, that is what we can do: raise a warband and find this Olot and his daughter and make them tell us where Alain and all the others have gone. A warband, that’s it.

  She slipped the knife into the kit and again paused and looked about. What else do I need? — Oh, if for some reason I must travel far, I will need Moments later, Camille rifled through her jewelry boxes and took brooches and rings and necklaces and bracelets and other such jewelry of significant value. Then she went to the steward’s office, and in Lanval’s desk she found a small lockbox, which she bore to the smithy and broke open using Renaud’s great bronze hammer and a chisel. From the box she took up a handful of gold coins, yet she paused. It won’t do to flash a gold piece just anywhere, nor the jewelry either. There may be thieves about, and-Oh, but I did send that poacher’s woman away with nought but a gold piece. I should have specified silver and bronze. Camille added silver and bronze to the coinage, then she buried the lockbox in Andre’s compost pile.

  Yet thinking of thieves, she went to the seamstress chamber, and there she sewed jewelry and coins into the lining of her all-weather woolen travelling cloak and behind a panel in the rucksack. And she stitched together a money belt to wear under her jerkin.

  Night fell, and she spent it in one of the abandoned stables, sleeping in straw, where perhaps Olot and his Goblins would not think to look if they came that eve.

  The next morning, she took breakfast in the manor, eating rapidly so as to be away without delay.

  I wonder if there are enough folk in the Forests of the Seasons to raise a warband? Perhaps that great man with a scythe has kindred elsewhere. I know of few living in the Summerwood: a handful of smallholders who came on business, that poacher’s wife-now gone-and the Lynx Riders and those of us here at the Camille paused, a biscuit partway to her mouth.

  The Lady of the Mere, a seer, and she lives not far from here, or so Alain did say. Perhaps she can help. But wait; Alain also said, “.. she only appears in circumstances dire.” Then he said the disappearance of his sire and dam would not seem to be one of those events. Since that is the case, what chance have I that she will be about, even should I find the mere? I mean, if the disappearance of a king and queen was not enough to cause her to show… — Ah, fille, if you do not try, then you will never know.

  Bearing her rucksack and bedroll and waterskin, Camille spent the day walking through the woodland surrounding Summerwood Manor, her path spiralling ever outward in a pattern she hoped would swiftly bring her to the Lady of the Mere. And from time to time she called out for aid, yet no one answered, though birds and small animals flew and scuttled away from this creature disturbing their lives, a doe and a fawn fleeing as well.

  As twilight fell across the land, adding its silvery light to that of the ever-present twilight of Faery, Camille made a small camp on a hill rising above the forest, and she was dismayed to see the manor standing what seemed to be but a stone’s throw away, yet, in truth, it was full mile or two off. Even so, she cried herself to sleep that night.

  For three days did Camille search without success, for she knew not how far or which way the mere of the lady did lie. Too, she could have easily passed by a small pool without ever knowing it was there. And Camille’s spirits fell into a pit of despair at the futility of her quest.

  And on the eve of that fourth day of fruitless searching, with her head in her hands she sat on the remains of a long-fallen tree and quietly wept.

  “Why do you weep, Lady Camille?” came a voice.

  18

  Mere

  Startled, Camille gasped, her tears stemmed. And she looked up to see a Lynx Rider stepping out from the tall grass, his cat following. Reaching nearly to his knees, a brace of voles dangled from the rider’s belt, and he carried his bow in hand. He stopped before Camille, and she thought from the markings on his face, she knew him.

  “Lord Kelmot?”

  Kelmot bowed. “At your service, my lady.” Then he turned and signalled the lynx, who sat, and began licking a paw and washing its face and ears.

  “May I aid you, my lady?” asked the tiny lord.

  He smiled, again revealing a mouthful of catlike teeth, and as close as he was, in spite of the failing light, Camille could see that his eyes were catlike as well-yellow and with a vertical slit of a pupil.

  “My lord, I am most desperate,” said Camille, “for I seek the Lady of the Mere, and I know not where I must go.”

  Kelmot took a deep breath. “My lady, I can take you there; yet heed: none seek the Lady of the Mere unless somewhat dire is afoot, and even then she may not appear.”

  Camille burst into tears anew, and though Lord Kelmot was nonplused, his lynx merely looked up from its grooming, and then went back to washing itself. Finally, Camille regained control of her weeping, and though tears yet welled in her eyes, oft to break free and stream down her face, she haltingly told him of her disastrous attempt to put an end to the curse, speaking of the candle and her mother’s urgings, of Alain’s remark concerning the geas, of her readings in the great library, and her hesitancy to light the candle within the darkened room but then succumbing, and of the wax falling onto Alain, and the wind and the screams therein, and of Alain becoming the Bear, and the disappearances of all in the thunderous blow, and of the wind itself vanishing, leaving nought but destruction in its wake, and of her search for anyone yet within the manse, but finding all were gone.

  Full night had fallen when she came to tale’s end, a waning half-moon high in the sky, and Kelmot, now seated on the ground, looked up at her and nodded as if unto himself. “Ah, so that was it. The night my sons and I came to the manse because of the poacher’s wife, Steward Lanval told us the prince would be wearing a mask, yet he did not tell us why; but now you, my lady, have; ’twas all because of a curse.” The tiny Lynx Rider then frowned and shook his head. “There is great magic at work here, and none I know has such at his command, most certainly not a Troll, for they are not natural wizards. Tell me, my lady, was there about him some token, some item of power?”

  Camille thought back to the only time she had seen Olot, there in the Winterwood. Slowly she shook her head. “Nay, Lord Kelmot, I think no-Oh, wait. There was about his neck on a leather thong an amulet of sorts. But it was quite insignificant, or at least seemed so.”

  “An amulet?”

  “Yes. Small and round and dull, almost as if made of clay.”

  Kelmot gasped and then looked about as if seeking eavesdroppers. “It mu
st have been one of the Seals of Orbane,” he whispered. “I thought them long-lost or long-gone.”

  “My lord?”

  Kelmot took a deep breath and let it out. “Orbane was a great wizard, yet evil grasped his heart. As to that which you thought was but a clay amulet, it was a seal holding within a great and fearsome power; there were seven seals in all, each one capable of invoking a terrible curse when broken-speak the curse, break the seal, and such will it be.”

  “Though you numbered them seven, I saw but one. What of the other six seals?”

  “Two were destroyed when we trapped Orbane in the Castle of Shadows in the Great Darkness beyond the Black Wall of the World. The missing five: we thought them gone, used up by Orbane or perhaps lost. But it seems we were wrong, for nought else I know of has the power to do that which you described-the wind, the vanishment, Prince Alain cursed to be the Bear in the day. Too, it would explain how Olot, and indeed his daughter, could cause such great harm, and it’s just like a Troll and his spawn to use such for their own vengeful ends. Most certainly they had at least two of the seals: the daughter one, the sire another. Wherefrom, I cannot say.”

  Camille frowned. “Lord Kelmot, you say Alain was cursed to be the Bear in the day, but on our journeys he was the Bear in the night as well; even so, at Summerwood Manor, he was Alain at night, and not the Bear.”

  In the moonlight, Kelmot shrugged. “Mayhap at night he had a choice as to which he would be; while in the day he had none.”

  Camille frowned and added, “Then again, perhaps it is only Summerwood Manor where he could become Alai-No, wait. He was also Alain when he was on the ridge with Olot in the Winterwood, or at least I think it was Alain.”

  “And that was nighttime as well?”

  “Yes.”

  They fell silent for a moment, but the lynx suddenly stood and faced away, its ears twitching.