“There’s a story here for the telling,” said Maurice, replenishing Borel’s cup of wine.
“Perhaps someday I will,” said Borel, nodding his thanks, “but let me see if I am right.
“Chelle would have been about ten at the time Pere and I were at Duke Roulan’s manor twenty years back. And so, when another eight years passed, then she would have reached her majority. I believe that would have been nearly twelve years ago-eleven years, ten moons, and a handful of days to be exact.”
Maurice turned up a hand, but Borel said, “It all seems right, if I have correctly reckoned the mortal years.”
Borel looked to Charite for confirmation, and she nodded, then stood and stepped to her bedchamber and came back to the table, bearing a kerchief, which she used to cover Flic. Next to him, Buzzer shifted, but didn’t waken, the bee dormant for the night.
“Tell me,” said Borel, “what happened that day?”
“Well,” said Maurice, “Charite and I, we took two of these very chairs to the yard and sat and watched as the lords and ladies and their attendants all rode past on their fine horses or in their splendid carriages, all heading up the road toward the manor. Brun was a pup at the time, and he was quite excited by all the doings going by.”
“Tell him about the Fey ladies on the horses with silver bells,” said Charite.
“I was just getting to it,” replied Maurice. He turned to Borel and said, “As Charite says, there were a number of Fey ladies on horses bedecked with silver bells that rode past, the ladies laughing together as if sharing a great secret.”
“They were magical, I think,” said Charite. “Fairies or some such, I would guess, what with their silky gowns flowing in the wind and such, the silver bells all achime. I believe they were the same ones who attended the birth, though we didn’t see them at that time.”
“The birth?” said Borel.
“Oui, of the duke’s daughter,” replied Charite. “It is said that Fey women came then.”
“Regardless,” said Maurice, “there was many a rich lord and lady went past, as well as the Fey Folk with their tilted eyes and golden hair and delicate ways.”
There came a lowing from without, and Maurice said, “Oh, my, what with all the talk, I forgot to milk Madame Vache. I will go do it now.” Maurice stood and added, “Much like that day, I was milking when it happened.”
“When what happened?” asked Borel.
“Why, Charite called me to come and see,” said Maurice. “When I stepped out from the byre, Charite screamed and pointed up toward the duke’s vale, and I turned and looked.” Maurice’s eyes widened in memory, and he thumped the table and said, “And that’s when the great black wind came, and the valley turned to stone; either that, or the entire dell just up and flew away, dirt, plants, manor and all.”
Jolted awake by the thump, “Hradian?” asked Flic, sitting up and rubbing his eyes, the Sprite hearking back to the story Borel had told him. “I mean, with a black wind and all, it seems the same sort of thing to me.”
“No, not Hradian,” said Borel, grimly, “but her sister instead. I deem this is her curse, the one I read of in Hradian’s journal.”
“Could Hradian’s sister be this Rhensibe?” asked Flic.
“Mayhap,” said Borel.
“Rhensibe?” hoarsely whispered the crofter, and both he and his wife made warding signs.
24
Moonlight
“They say she’s a sorciere, this Rhensibe,” whispered Charite.
“Oui. In town there are some who claim she has some sort of grievance against the duke,” said Maurice, “or she did, until the valley turned to stone.”
“You know this for a fact?” asked Borel.
“Well, rumor would have it be so,” said Maurice.
Charite nodded her agreement and said, “I think someone-perhaps one of those Fey ladies-anyway, someone said-’round the time of Lady Chelle’s birth I think-that Rhensibe’s rancor against the duke goes back to a distant time.”
Flic looked at Borel. “What was it Hradian wrote in her journal about her sister?”
Borel took a deep breath and intoned, “ ‘On this same day in a linked act, my elder sister cast a great spell upon Roulan and his entire estate through his daughter Chelle, on this the day of her majority’-”
Maurice and Charite gasped, and Maurice said, “Ominous words, them.”
“That great spell had to be the black wind,” said Flic. “But we interrupted you, Lord Borel. There was more.”
“Oui,” said the prince, “there was more. ‘This vengeance is so very sweet, for Roulan was the accomplice of Valeray the Thief. And now all are ensorcelled and well warded; and since none can find Roulan’s daughter-or even if they do, all attempts to rescue her from the turret will fail-then when the rising full moon sits on the horizon eleven years and eleven moons from now…’ ” Borel paused, then added, “That’s as far as I read in the journal ere Hradian came.”
“And Hradian is…?” asked Maurice.
“A witch,” replied Borel. “A very powerful witch.”
Maurice and Charite nodded and looked at one another, and Charite said, “Another sorciere.”
“Like Rhensibe is said to be,” added Maurice.
“Perhaps sisters,” said Flic.
“They must have had a pact,” said Borel. “My sire and the duke were both cursed, all for what they did during the struggle against Orbane.”
“Orbane!” exclaimed Maurice and Charite together, making warding signs. And Maurice pled, “Oh, Lord Borel, speak of him no more, for we would not sear our minds with thoughts of that foul magicien nor have his name uttered in this house. It might draw him here.”
“But he is cast out,” said Borel, “banished to the Castle of Shadows beyond the Black Wall of the World.”
Both Maurice and Charite moaned in fear, and from under the table, Brun whined, the dog sensing his masters’ dread. Charite said, “Oh, my lord prince, we will not hear any more, else he himself is likely to appear.” And she grabbed Maurice by the arm and together they fled to their bedchamber and slammed the door to, and left Brun sitting without and whimpering.
The dog looked over his shoulder at Borel, seeking reassurance. Borel growled a word or two, and Brun settled down.
A moment later, the door opened a crack and Brun jumped to his feet. Through the gap a blanket was tossed into the main room, and Charite called, “Sieur, you may sleep in the loft,” and she slammed shut the door again, abandoning Brun. The dog came to Borel and looked up at him, and the prince reached down and stroked the animal’s head.
From outside, there came a persistent lowing, and Borel and Flic heard the slide of a window sash. Borel looked at Flic and said, “It is Maurice. He’s gone out through the window to milk the cow.”
Flic yawned and said, “Speaking of windows, would you open that one a bit?”
“Ah, yes, fresh air,” said Borel.
“Or something of the sort,” said Flic.
As Borel stepped to the sash and lowered it, the jamb sliding into the recess below, Flic lay back down near dormant Buzzer and pulled the kerchief to his chin and yawned and said, “Good night.” Then he grinned and added, “Pleasant dreams.”
“Good night,” said Borel, and he took up the blanket and climbed the ladder to the loft. And even as Madame Vache out in the byre quit bellowing now that Maurice had come to relieve her of her milk, and as Brun took station under the table and turned ’round several times before flopping down, Borel fell fast asleep.
In the faint breeze, water lapped softly against the shore. The just-risen half-moon cast a long glimmer of light across the rippling surface. “I thought we might take a stroll by this lakeside,” said Borel.
“Oh,” said Chelle. “I was rather hoping this night I would see the Winterwood.”
“Perhaps another time, my love,” said Borel. “You see, I would rather take you there when I find you at last.”
Chelle l
aughed. “But I am not lost, my lord. Must we play hide-and-seek ere you show me your demesne?”
Borel’s laughter joined hers. Still, he did not dare say more, else she might wrench them both back into the turret, wherever it might be. He closed his eyes a moment, and then opened them again. “I think there is a small skiff just past this stand of reeds. Would you join me in a row?”
“Oh, yes, my Borel. I would.”
Borel frowned a moment. “Ere we go out onto the water, I need to ask: can you swim?”
“Indeed,” said Chelle, and of a sudden she stood unclothed on a bluff above the lake, her golden hair gleaming in the moonlight, her firm young breasts high, her aureoles pale, her narrow waist gracefully flaring into slim rounded hips tapering down to her long slender legs, a golden triangle at her cleft. Borel’s breath shuddered inward, for she was splendid. Laughing, she dived outward and down into the pellucid waters of the lake.
Borel found himself naked beside her, his blood pulsing, a fire in his loins, and in the water he took her in his arms and kissed her hungrily as they sank below the surface, his erect manhood pressing against her No! I cannot do this!
Borel wrenched himself awake, and he groaned softly in his desire. Yet- Great Mithras, what have I done to Chelle? Is she trapped in a place of my making? I must return to that dream. I must!
Borel tried to will himself to sleep, yet he could not force slumber, and he lay with his mind racing, wondering, anxiety gnawing at his viscera, his breath rasping in disquiet.
This will never do.
Down from the loft he clambered, and as he crossed the floor he glanced at the table- Flic is missing. Buzzer is here, but Flic…? Borel looked at the open window, moonlight shining in. Mayhap he has gone outside to relieve himself.
With Brun at his side, Borel stepped into the yard, his mind yet churning in turmoil, his gaze irresistibly drawn toward the mouth of Lord Roulan’s vale. He glanced at the waning half-moon, now risen some four fists above the horizon- Two candlemarks past mid of night — its light angling across the slope and foothills above and the mountains beyond.
Shaking his head, he turned and walked out to the byre, Brun running ahead. Madame Vache stood inside adoze.
Yet Borel couldn’t keep his mind off his beloved, and he looked once more at the vale. Not only might she be cast adrift in a dream of my own making, but somewhere in Faery, or mayhap not, she is lost to me as well, and I need to find her. And there are but some twenty-one days until the moon is full again. Oh, Michelle, my Chelle, where are you?
Then Borel saw a faint glitter flashing through the air… nearing. What can that…?
He watched as it drew close, a tiny flickering luminescence, or perhaps moonlight glancing off Wings! It is Flic.
The Sprite sped toward the stead, and then veered toward Borel. Now Brun saw the glimmer, and he set up a din at this strange “Brun,” said Borel, and then a guttural word, and the dog immediately stopped.
Flic flew down and alighted on Borel’s shoulder.
“I thought it would be worth a look,” said the Sprite, “yet I found it unchanged, nought but stone.” He sighed in dejection and said, “I was wrong.”
“Wrong about what, Flic?”
“I’ve heard tales of enchanted people and places and things that only reveal their true form or can only be seen or only show up in moonlight. It seems Lord Roulan’s estate is not one of those. Either that, or perhaps this moon is simply not full enough for the vale to appear.”
25
Adieu
“You flew over the vale?”
“Yes, and along it, too. I went there to see if all would reappear in the light of the moon. And as I said, it did not.”
“Ah, then, that’s why you had me open the window. Why didn’t you tell me what you planned?”
“I didn’t want to raise any false hopes,” said Flic. He sighed and added, “Would that my own lifted hopes had been realized, yet they were not.-But you, Lord Borel, what are you doing out and about?”
“My dream got away from me,” replied Borel. “I’m afraid I might have stranded Chelle in a place of my making.”
“How so?”
“I nearly did that which I said was unprincipled: bed her on the whim of a dream. When I realized what I was about to do, I wakened. And so she may be-I don’t know where-lost in my dream as well as in reality.”
“Gracious me,” said Flic. “Well then, you’re just going to have to go back to sleep and rescue her from the quandary of your making.”
“I tried, Flic, but sleep now eludes me. That’s why I am out in the night, trying to achieve a measure of serenity so that I can fall aslumber. But my mind is racing helterskelter, and stillness of my spirit eludes me. What I need is”-Borel turned about, searching-“Ah, I see.”
Borel stepped to a woodpile, where an axe stood embedded in a upright stump. “Fly, my friend,” he said. “Labor will tire my body and perhaps my mind.”
“As you wish, my lord,” said Flic, and he launched himself from Borel’s shoulder and into the air and flew ’round the cottage and in through the open window.
Borel wrenched the axe free from the chopping block and took up a billet. “Step back, Brun,” he said, adding a guttural, and the dog moved away.
Shortly, the night air was filled with the sound of hewing as Borel split logs and stacked wood. Maurice drew aside the curtain on the bedroom window and peered out, then he turned to say something to Charite as he let the fabric fall back.
The moon had risen another two fists when Borel embedded the blade of the axe once more into the chopping block. He sat long moments in the cool air while gazing at the moon, and then went back into the house, Brun following. Into the loft he crawled and lay down to sleep, yet he tossed and turned fitfully, and did not dream again that night.
“My lord prince,” said Charite as she fixed a great breakfast of eggs and sausage and warmed up the biscuits, “I want to apologize for our fearful behavior last eve. You may call us foolish for being in such dread over… er… um… the magicien who shall not be named, but strange things happen in Faery, such as the duke’s valley turning to stone and such. And so, we know firsthand, do Maurice and I, that terrible things can come about when sorcieres and magiciens and other such are involved, to say nothing of strange creatures, like Trolls and Ogres and Goblins and-”
“Madame Charite, give it no second thought,” said Borel, “for you are right in fearing Orb-Pardon me, in fearing the magicien who shall not be named.”
“Well, Maurice and I, we just thought it best to not tempt fate,” said Charite.
In that moment, Maurice came through the door, Flic riding on his left shoulder, Buzzer on his right, another bucket of milk in hand. “Madame Vache, she seems full morning and night,” he said as the Sprite and the bee flew to the table. “It means more butter and cheese and curds to sell in town… and buttermilk,” he added, as he covered the pail with a cloth and set it by the churn.
“The cream, it’s quite delicious,” said Flic, and glanced at Buzzer. “And she agrees.”
“Good morrow, Monsieur Maurice,” said Borel.
Maurice bobbed his head and returned the greeting and said, “I thank you, my lord, for setting aside a goodly amount of wood.”
“Did I wake you? If so, I am sorry. I was working out a problem.”
“A problem, my lord?”
“Yes. You see, I thought that I had reached an impasse, a cul-de-sac, but as I wielded your axe, I realized I hadn’t. At least, not quite. I will go to the town and see if there is something of truth to the rumor you spoke of, something that might send me on my way. Perhaps I can find someone therein who knows ought of Lord Roulan and Chelle, or where this Rhensibe might dwell.”
“Oh, my lord prince,” said Charite, as she ladled out great spoonfuls of eggs and slid sausages onto Borel’s plate, “ ’fi were you, I wouldn’t have ought to do with Rhensibe. But as to perhaps finding Lord Roulan’s estate and the duke
and his daughter-assuming the vale and all were carried away by that black wind-well, that’s a noble goal, and we wish you good fortune in that.”
Her eyebrow cocked, Charite looked at Flic and slightly lifted her platter of breakfast fare, but he waved her off, saying, “None for me, thanks. I’m full of rich cream from Madame Vache, and so is Buzzer.”
“As you wish, Sieur Flic,” Charite said, and she spooned out eggs and sausage to Maurice, while he passed the biscuits to Borel.
Charite looked at wagging-tail Brun and said, “You can have what’s left over, Monsieur Dog.”
“Come look!” called Maurice.
Borel placed four copper pennies on the table, and then took up his bow and stepped through the back door to join Maurice and Charite.
They stood behind the cottage and watched as Flic and Buzzer flew over the fields of crops and the byre and cote, over the pond and well, and over the green pasture where Madame Vache grazed contentedly. They could hear the Sprite calling out something or mayhap even singing, Buzzer’s humming wings accompanying Flic. Yet what the Sprite cried or sang, they could not quite hear, though it was definitely lilting words of a sort, mayhap in a language unfamiliar.
Finally, Flic and Buzzer came spiralling down and landed on Borel’s tricorn, and Flic said, “There, I’ve blessed your entire stead, Monsieur Maurice and Madame Charite. What good it’ll do, I cannot say, for I’ve not done such a thing until now.”
“Oh, Sieur Sprite, we thank you, we thank you,” gushed Charite happily, beaming in gratitude. She elbowed Maurice in the ribs, and he humbly added his own thanks as well.
Borel made a slight bow and said, “Madame, Monsieur, I thank you for your hospitality, and if I am ever back this way, Maurice, I will tell that tale of my pere and mere’s enchantment and how Camille managed to dispel the glamour. But now we must hie to the town, for Chelle is entrapped somewhere and I would set her free.” Borel then turned to Brun and spoke a word or two, gutturals mixed within, and the dog seemed to take heart, and his tail curled up o’er his back.
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