by Frank Miller
“He spits on the ground when I pass!”
“Or the fire in Gifford’s barn—”
“You keep bringing that up!”
“You keep giving me reason to!” Lenore took Nimue by the shoulders. “This is your clan. These are your people, not your enemies.”
“It’s not like I haven’t tried. I have! But they won’t accept me. They hate me.”
“Then teach them. Help them understand. Because one day you’ll have to help lead them. When I’m gone—”
“Lead them?” Nimue laughed.
“You are gifted,” Lenore said. “You see them, you experience them in ways that I will never understand. But such a gift is a privilege, not a right, to be received with grace and humility.”
“It’s not a gift.”
A distant bell sounded. Lenore held up Nimue’s torn and muddied hem. “You couldn’t make an exception? This one day?”
Nimue shrugged, a little embarrassed.
Lenore sighed. “Come.”
She proceeded carefully through a veil of clinging vines and down a set of ancient stairs, slick with mud and moss. Nimue grazed her hands along the sculpted walls, which depicted ancient myths of the Old Gods, to steady her descent into the enormous Sunken Temple. The sun poured hundreds of feet down through a natural vent in the canopy to bathe the altar stone.
“Why do I have to attend this at all?” Nimue said, padding along the tilting path that spiraled all the way to the bottom.
“We are choosing the Summoner who will one day be the Arch Druid. Today is an important day, and you are my daughter and should be by my side.”
Nimue rolled her eyes as they reached the temple floor, where the village elders had already gathered. A few of them glowered at her presence, and she made a point of avoiding the circle and slouching against one of the far walls.
Kneeling before the altar in meditation was the son of Gustave the Healer, Clovis, a young Druid who had been a loyal acolyte to Lenore and was respected for his wide scholarship in healing magic.
The Elders sat cross-legged in the circle as Lenore took Clovis’s hand and helped him to stand. Gustave the Healer was also present, dressed in his finest, beaming with pride. He sat with the elders as Lenore turned to address them. “As Sky Folk we give thanks to the light that gives life. We are born in the dawn . . .”
“To pass in the twilight,” the elders answered in unison.
Lenore paused, closing her eyes. Her head tilted as though listening to something. After a moment, glowing marks, like silvery vines threaded up the right side of her neck, up her cheek, and around her ear.
The Fingers of Airimid appeared on Nimue’s cheeks and those of the elders in the circle.
Lenore opened her eyes. “The Hidden are now present.” She went on, “Since our dear Agatha passed, we have been without a Summoner. This has left us without a successor, without a Keeper of Relics and without a Harvest Priest. Agatha also shared a deep communion with the Hidden. She was a dear and devoted friend. She will never be replaced. But the nine moons have passed, and it is time to name a new Summoner. And while there are many attributes that a Summoner should possess, none is more important than an abiding relationship to the Hidden. And though we love our Clovis”—Lenore offered a reassuring smile to the young Druid standing by the altar—“we still need the Hidden to anoint our choice of Summoner.”
Lenore whispered ancient words and lifted her arms. The light spilling in from above took on a sharpness, like the fires of the forge, and tiny sparks plumed away from the light to dance in the air. The same light drifted from the moss that covered the obelisks and ancient boulders, mixing with the sparks into a flowing luminous cloud.
Clovis shut his eyes and spread out his arms to receive the blessing of the Hidden. The sparks drifted toward him in an amorphous mass, then curled and twisted away from him and the altar, lengthening and stretching toward Nimue, who watched, eyes gradually widening, as the cloud poured over her. She lifted an arm to shield herself, though the sparks caused her no pain.
But what was happening caused a stir among the circle of Elders.
Lenore stood tall, with an expression of wonder, as the murmurs of protest grew into raised voices. Gustave stood up to protest. “This—this ritual is impure.”
One of the others said, “Clovis is in line.”
And another, “Nimue is a distraction.”
“Clovis is talented and kind, and I value his counsel. But the decision to name the Summoner belongs to the Hidden,” Lenore said.
“What?” Nimue said out loud. She felt cornered by their accusing stares. Her cheeks burned and she shot her mother a furious look as she tried to escape the cloud, climbing to her feet, but the light particles were determined to follow her, bathing her in light at the very moment she wished to be invisible.
Florentin the miller appealed to logic. “But Lenore, surely you can’t suggest . . . I mean, Nimue is too young for such responsibilities.”
“True, at sixteen years she would be young for a Summoner,” Lenore acknowledged, speaking as though not surprised by the turn of events, “but her rapport with the Hidden should outweigh such considerations. Above all else, the Summoner is expected to know the mind of the Hidden and to guide the Sky Folk to balance and harmony on both planes of existence. Since she was very young, the Hidden have been drawn to Nimue.”
Lucien, a venerable Druid, who supported his bent frame with a sturdy branch of yew, asked, “It isn’t only the Hidden who seek her out, is it?”
The scars on her back tingled. Nimue knew where this was going.
Lenore’s lips pursed ever so slightly, the only sign of her fury.
Lucien scratched his white and patchy beard, feigning innocence. “After all, she is marked by dark magic.”
“We are not children, Lucien. They may call us Sun Dancers, but that does not mean we are ignorant of the shadow. Yes, when she was very young, Nimue was lured to the Iron Wood by a dark spirit and would have very likely been killed, or worse, were it not for the intervention of the Hidden. One might suggest that event alone makes her a worthy Summoner.”
“That is the story we’ve been told,” Lucien sneered.
Nimue wanted to shrink and crawl into a rat hole. And the light particles would not leave her. Annoyed, she waved them off, but they would disperse only to return to her like a halo.
“What exactly are you suggesting about my daughter, Lucien?”
Gustave tried to play peacemaker and to preserve his son’s chances of being Summoner. “Let us simply have another go at the ritual with Nimue not present.”
“Do we now question the wisdom of the Hidden if we do not prefer their choice?” Lenore asked.
“She is a corrupter!” Lucien snapped.
“You take that back,” Lenore warned him.
Lucien pressed on, “We’re not alone in our suspicions. Her own father rejected her, choosing to abandon his own clan rather than live under the same roof as she.”
Nimue stepped into the circle of Elders. “I don’t want to be your bloody Summoner! Happy now? I don’t want it!” Before Lenore could stop her, Nimue spun and raced up the winding path as the shouting voices below her echoed off the ancient stone walls.
THREE
NIMUE COULD ONLY BREATHE AGAIN when she erupted into the fresh air of the Iron Wood, choking back tears, too furious to let herself cry. She wanted to drown that old fool Lucien and tear her mother’s hair out for making her sit through that mockery of a ceremony.
Pym, Nimue’s best friend, was tall and gangly and was struggling to carry a sheaf of wheat across the field when she saw Nimue marching down the hill, away from the forest.
“Nimue!” Pym dropped her sheaf and caught up with Nimue, who brushed past her. “What is it?”
“I’m Summoner.” Nimue kept on charging.
Pym swung a look to the barrow and then back to Nimue. “You’re what? Wait, did Lenore say that?”
“Who cares?
” Nimue spat. “It’s all a joke.”
“Slow down.” Pym loped after her, already weary from lugging the wheat.
“I hate it here. I’m leaving. I’m getting on that ship today.”
“What happened?” Pym swung Nimue around.
Nimue’s expression was fierce, but there were tears in her eyes. She quickly wiped them away on her sleeve.
Pym softened. “Nimue?”
“They don’t want me here. And I don’t want them.” Nimue’s voice trembled.
“You’re not making any sense.”
Nimue ducked into the small wood-and-mud hut she shared with her mother and pulled a sack out from under her bed, while Pym huffed in the doorway. Inside the sack were a heavy woolen cloak, mittens and extra stockings, wood-ash soap, flint, an empty waterskin, nuts, and dried apples. She took a few honey cakes from the table, then was out the door as quickly as she’d come.
Pym followed her. “Where are you going?”
“Hawksbridge,” Nimue answered.
“Now? Are you mad?”
Before Nimue could answer, shouts arose. She and Pym looked down the road and saw a boy being helped from a horse. Even from a distance, Nimue could see the horse’s white coat was smeared with blood. One of the village men carried the boy in his arms. The boy’s skin was light blue, his arms were unnaturally long and thin, and his fingers were spindly, ideal for climbing.
“It’s a Moon Wing,” Pym whispered.
The villagers hurried the injured Moon Wing boy into the Healer’s hut, and scouts rushed to the Iron Wood to inform the Elders. Led by Lenore, they all emerged from the forest with serious expressions. They passed Pym and Nimue with scarcely a glance, except for Lucien, who gave Nimue a crooked smile as he hobbled to the Healer’s hut.
Nimue and Pym knelt down by the shutters as Lenore and the Elders gathered inside the hut. Moon Wings were a rare sight anywhere, being shy and nocturnal, adapted to life in the canopy of the deep forests. Their feet rarely touched the ground, and their skin could take on the color and texture of the bark of whatever tree they were climbing. Besides that, ancient bad blood between Sky Folk and Moon Wings made this boy’s appearance in Dewdenn all the more strange and disturbing.
The boy’s chest rattled as he spoke, and his voice was weak. “They came by day as we slept. They wore red robes.” The boy coughed raggedly, and the rattle worsened. “They set fire to the forest, trapping us in the branches. Many died in their sleep from the smoke. Others leaped to their deaths. For those who made it to the ground, the Gray Monk, the one who cries, was waiting. He cut us down. Hanged the rest of us on their crosses.” Another jag of coughing left the boy breathless and his lips wet with blood. Lenore soothed him as Gustave hurried about, preparing a poultice.
“This is no longer a southern problem. The Red Paladins are moving north. We’re right in their path,” warned Felix, a barrel-chested farmer and one of the Elders.
“Until we learn more about their movement and numbers, no one is to travel,” Lenore said.
Florentin spoke up. “How do we sell our goods without market day?”
“We’ll send out scouts today. Hopefully this restriction will only take us through one moon cycle. In the meantime we’ll make do. Open the fields. Share. And we should reach out to the other clans.”
As the Elders debated, Nimue pulled Pym away from the window and headed for the stables.
“What, you’re still going?” Pym asked.
“Of course,” Nimue said. Waiting would only make things worse. It had to be now.
“Your mother just told us we can’t go to Hawksbridge.”
Nimue entered the stables, grabbed her saddle from a hook, and prepared her palfrey, Dusk Lady, for riding.
“I’m not letting you get on any ship. I’m not saying goodbye.”
Nimue tried to be stern. “Pym—”
“I’m not.” Pym folded her arms.
Hawksbridge was a ten-mile ride through rolling hills and dense forest. It was large enough to draw entertainers and mercenaries to its taverns and hold a decent market on every other Thursday, so to Sky Folk like Nimue and Pym, it was Rome, it was all the world. A heavy wooden fort overlooked the town from a northern rise. More than a dozen hanged men fed the crows from the fort’s highest wall, a grim warning to strangers and thieves.
Pym shuddered at the sight. She pulled the hood of her cloak tighter around her face. “These cloaks are crap disguises. And I’ve been doing chores all day. I smell.”
“I told you not to come,” Nimue reminded her. “And you don’t smell. Much.”
“I hate you,” Pym growled.
“You’re beautiful and you smell like violets,” Nimue soothed, though she tucked her hair under her own hood just to be safe. Fey Kind wore their hair down, unlike women in town, who wore it under a wimple or head covering.
“This is madness,” Pym said.
“It’s why you love me.”
“I don’t love you. I’m still going to stop you and I’m angry you’re doing this.”
“I bring adventure to your life.”
“You bring stress and punishment to my life.”
The guards at the eastern gate allowed Pym and Nimue through with little fuss. The girls stabled Dusk Lady in a stall near the gate and walked to the port at Scarcroft Bay, a small harbor for local fishermen and sea traders. Loud gulls hovered about the hulks and small cogs, then dove to the dozens of filled traps of catch lining the docks, fighting over the squirming contents.
As they approached the crowded, noisy dock, Nimue could feel Pym shaking with nerves.
“How do you even know they’ll take you on?” Pym asked.
“The Brass Shield takes on a few dozen pilgrims every journey. I was told this was the ship Gawain took. It’s the only ship that crosses the sea to the Desert Kingdoms.” Nimue swerved around a boy with a box of live crabs.
“Of course it’s the only ship that goes to the Desert Kingdoms. What does that tell you? That no one wants to go to the Desert Kingdoms, that’s what. Honestly, what is the fuss about? Being named Summoner is a huge honor. The robes are glorious and you get to wear amazing jewelry. Where is the problem?”
“It’s more complicated than that,” Nimue said. She loved Pym like a sister, but she never liked to talk about the Hidden. Pym liked what she could see and what she could touch. It was one area, really the only area with Pym, where Nimue kept her feelings to herself.
“At least your mother wants you home. Mine keeps trying to marry me off to the fishmonger.”
Nimue nodded, sympathetic. “Stinky Aaron.”
Pym glared at her. “It’s not funny.”
As Nimue took in the enormity of what she was about to do, she grew serious. She turned to Pym, wanting her to understand. “The Elders won’t accept me.” It was half the truth.
“Who cares what those shriveled onions think?”
“But what if they’re right not to?”
Pym shrugged. “So, you have visions.”
“And the scars.”
“They give you character?” Pym offered. “I mean, I’m trying to be helpful here.”
Nimue laughed and hugged her. “What will I do without you?”
Pym welled up. “Then stay, you idiot.”
Nimue shook her head sadly, then turned and marched back to the dock. Pym hurried behind her like a worried hen.
“What if they find out you’re Fey Kind? What if they see the Fingers of Airimid?” Pym whispered.
“They won’t,” Nimue hissed back. “You’ll take care of Dusk Lady?”
“Yes. What about money?”
“I have twenty silver.” Nimue sighed, exasperated.
“But what if they rob you?”
“Pym, enough!” Nimue half shouted as she approached the bald and sweating harbormaster, who was waving off aggressive gulls at his table.
“Pardon me, sir, but which of these is the Brass Shield?” Nimue asked.
The
port master never looked up from his lists. “Brass Shield left yesterday.”
“But I thought—I thought . . .” Nimue turned to Pym. “Gawain left in midwinter. It’s only November. It should still be here.”
“Tell that to the easterly winds,” the harried port master countered, his voice edged with annoyance.
“When does it return?” Nimue pleaded, escape slipping away.
The port master looked up, his eyes drooping, and scowled. “Six months! Now do you mind?” A shoving match between fishermen ensued nearby, upsetting traps and scattering birds. The port master forgot Nimue and Pym immediately and ran over to the scrum. “Oy! None of that here! Knock that off!”
Nimue turned to her friend, eyes brimming with tears. “What do I do now?”
Pym tucked Nimue’s hair beneath her hood. “Well, at least I get to keep you a bit longer.”
Nimue looked out to the horizon, trying to contemplate another six months in the village. It felt like an eternity.
Pym wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “You make peace with your mum.” She began to drag Nimue back to the stables.
“A pilgrim caravan,” Nimue decided, turning suddenly and marching back into town.
“Pilgrims? Pilgrims hate the Fey. That’s the very last place you should be seen.”
Nimue knew she was grasping at straws, but returning to Dewdenn was not an option.
Pym took her arm. Nimue could tell that her friend was determined to wear her down.
“Wait, I know,” Pym said, changing tactics. “I’ll be Summoner and you marry Stinky Aaron.”
Nimue’s scowl cracked. “I’m not—”
“Oh! So your life’s not so horrible after all!”
Nimue dashed off, and Pym chased her.
It was market day, and the narrow street was barely navigable for the steers pulling wagons of grain, packhorses hauling blocks of stone for the cathedral under construction, and barefoot farm boys chasing an errant gaggle of geese. A family of four, pilgrims by their dress, scowled at the girls, and the father muttered something under his breath as they passed.
