by Lana Nielsen
***
Darren sat at the table and looked forward to his fortune-telling. Elspeth had snuffed the candles and brought forth trays of incense for mystical effect. It intrigued him but also caused him to feel a little wicked. He squirmed atop his stool and tapped his feet on the floor.
A tabby cat appeared, wandering out from beneath the pantry. It leapt into Elspeth’s arms and she nuzzled the creature. It regarded Darren coolly with its amber eyes.
“What is its name?” Darren asked.
“She doesn’t need a name. She simply is.” The old woman smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkling. Darren found her answer unreasonably eccentric. He supposed this was just another element of the atmosphere Elspeth wanted to create. The tabby probably had a name just as mundane as that of Betty the cow. Mimi, Whiskers, Fluffy...
“How could I have forgotten?” Elspeth shook her head, “Before we begin, would you like a glass of wine?”
“No thanks, I’m still full from dinner,” Darren answered. The truth was he preferred to abstain from the stuff. It wasn’t a requirement as it was for priests or nuns, but he figured Agron would look more favorably upon him when the time came for the passage to paradise. The other young folk in Aelfelm always looked so foolish when they drank.
“Tis a shame. You know, I didn’t tell you about the wine until I got you alone for a reason. I don’t have much to spare, and you are the specialest of my visitors here today.” She winked, almost flirtatiously.
“Oh, erm, really. Thank you, ma’am. I am honored you believe that.”
“Aye, it was my grandfather’s and aged for ninety-eight years before the bottle was opened. I only share it with the most remarkable of guests. You could call it a personal tradition of sorts. Let me tell you, dear boy, I can feel the purity of your heart. It’s like a golden aura, shining into every nook and cranny of my wretched house.”
“Thank you, ma’am. If only it were true.” He lowered his eyes with pretend shame as he pressed his hand against his chest. “I am a sinner like any other. I—I suppose a half-filled cup won’t hurt,” he added, against his own good judgment.
What could he say? She made him feel important. No one else ever had, except perhaps during the harvest season when his hard work was complimented. She may have been a little peculiar, a little fishy, but she was clearly also kind and wise.
Elspeth produced the bottle of wine and a goblet from a secret drawer in the wall. “It’s funny,” she said, “The good are always down upon themselves while the evil are the first to proclaim their virtue.”
She poured the wine into the cup. Her hand brushed against his as he grasped the stem of the glass. For a split second, he saw Elspeth as a youthful maiden: her missing eye restored, her braid black and glossy, her skin smooth and taut, her bare breasts pert with rose-colored nipples… Darren surprised himself with a brief stirring in his middle and shook it off. His cheeks flamed with embarrassment as he sipped at the wine. It tasted unremarkable and sour—why did people act as if wine were some delectable treat? The alcohol burned his tongue and sinuses.
“You know, there should be a monastery nearby. They always take good care of the elderly,” he said.
Elspeth laughed. Instead of her usual gravelly cackle it sounded like a clear peeling of bells. What was wrong with him? He just wanted to have his fortune told. The smoke from the incense was giving him a headache and he figured he was too exhausted to think straight.
“May I read your palm now?” Elspeth asked, and Darren found himself focusing solely on her lips. They were full and soft and red. But how? He blinked to dispel the illusion.
Darren nodded to Elspeth after a long pause.
“Lay it flat on the table before me,” she commanded. Darren took one more gulp of his wine and did as she ordered. She leaned in closely, her eye inches from his palm. She hummed and licked his hand. Darren recoiled. In response, she grabbed his hand and laid it on the table again.
“I have to do it to get an accurate reading,” she said.
“You could’ve warned me!”
Elspeth pulled a deck of cards from her apron pocket and placed one the table. She slid it, face-down, towards Darren.
He flipped it over with his free hand. It was The Fool, laughing at him.
He felt uncomfortable.
“You have a long-life line and a long heart line. Your wealth line is short, but you must remember it doesn’t take into account what is inherited, so I wouldn’t fret too much.” She traced shapes on his saliva-coated palm. The lines she made with her fingers didn’t even correspond with the actual creases in his skin. She tapped his hand twice and grinned.
“I see that in three years’ time you’ll marry a rich, beautiful woman whose hand you’ll win because of your gallant deeds. She’ll be the moon to your sun. The two of you will have six children, three boys and three girls, all of them twins.”
Darren could tell the old woman was lying. Fortune-tellers always said nonsense like that. Why had he ever thought she was anything other than a charlatan? She probably still wanted a tip, too.
How could he have been so foolish? It had been yet another test from Agron that he had failed.
He sighed. “Is that it?”
“Aye, that’s it. Why? Are you unhappy with your fortune?” she asked.
“Oh, no, it’s lovely. It’s just... I thought I’d hear some word of the quest I’m on now.”
“Ahh. I’m sorry, lad. If you tell me more details about it, perhaps I can peer into the future a bit.”
“You are a seeress too?”
“I have many talents that Agron has given me. I swear I do not use them for Tifalla’s aims,” she said solemnly, assuaging Darren’s fears and tantalizing his curiosity.
“Oh… er… well… I suppose. We must whisper though. The others may get mad if we talk too long. Especially Fallon, he is always angry with me. Good man otherwise, as far as lairdlings go,” Darren rambled, feeling guilty for being too critical.
“I get a terrible vibe from that man,” Elspeth stated.
Darren nodded. “He’s not as bad as he seems. All bark, no bite.” He laughed and took a sip of his wine. He had drunk about half of it. “You know, your wine starts to taste better towards the bottom. Not that it wasn’t tasty right off. Tastes sort of like... apple pie?”
“Aye, it’s good.” Elspeth grinned, and pulled a pin from her hair. She stuck it in Darren’s cheek.
“What in Agron’s name?” He shrank back, nearly dropping his cup.
“You said you wanted to know more. I need your blood to do that. There is a price to be paid for knowledge,” Elspeth told him, glancing at the dark stain on the point of the bone-colored hairpin. She dropped the pin in the wine. Instantly steam rose from the cup. The contents of the goblet hissed and sang.
“You’re sure this isn’t in the service of Tifalla?” Darren asked as he nervously looked about the room. The cat purred from beneath the table and shimmied across his boots. It startled him, causing goosebumps to form on his arms.
“I swear upon the grave of my sweet husband,” Elspeth said. “There are many ways of becoming closer to Agron, you know, not all of them through your village priest.”
“If you say so…” Darren gulped. Elspeth slowly undid her braid and allowed her white hair to fall about her hunched shoulders like a cloak. Suddenly, Darren felt dizzy and couldn’t focus on anything. His stomach expanded and his head emptied. Elspeth drank from the steaming goblet and removed her eye patch. A fully-functional eye lay beneath it. He was glued to his seat and was soon unable to move his eyes from side to side. He could only stare straight ahead at Elspeth as his limbs stiffened.
She took three great swigs of the wine with orgasmic satisfaction, greedily licking her lips as she exhaled and closed her eyes.
“You are perfect, boy, just perfect!” she exclaimed in a younger woman’s voice. She was soon completely naked and in the form of the same maiden he had seen earlier, only this time
he was unable to dispel the vision. He slunk lower in his seat. His body fell to the floor with a heavy thud. He tried to roll over and get into a more comfortable position, but he could only move the tips of his fingers and toes. Ironically, as his body became unresponsive, he regained some degree of lucidity. His eyes were still fixed ahead.
He should have been frightened, but he wasn’t—only disappointed in himself for falling for Tifalla’s temptations. He would go to the netherworld and deserve it, suffering in a prison of ice for all eternity. He prayed for his grandparents, his friends back home, Arithel, and even Fallon.
Elspeth turned him over. He lay flat on his back, gazing up at the woman. She set the wine back on the table and wiped drool from her mouth. She knelt close to his face and her eyes rolled back into her head, only the whites showing. She menaced him with her bared teeth, smiling and growling at once. She straddled his crotch and gyrated against him like a succubus before kissing him.
“The prince is damned to die despite his servant’s watchful eye,” she whispered in his ear, “the echo of a star returns to curse your race as the errants wander, forever freed from time, freed from place. One forgets their name, but they all forgot his claim. A king in the shadow, true of heart but callow. I ask you, child, empty your hazy mind, rouse the sleeping and awake the blind. See what’s always been there, in the soil, in the air. Deeper than blood, darker than night. Soon, I promise, we can live without light.”
Darren was fascinated despite the perverseness of the whole situation. What did it mean? Who were these people? If only he could move his mouth, so that he might ask those questions!
“You understand?” she cackled as she transformed into the old hag again. “You’re the key; you’re the light, the lost heir that Tiresias never foresaw. You’ve a destiny to fulfill. You would have been very important, if I hadn’t taken all your fine blood first.”
She crouched like a frog, licked one of her long nails, and drew three cuts into each of his cheeks. It was not painful—Darren couldn’t feel anything at all beyond a mild tingling sensation. She collected the droplets of blood from the wound with a tiny spoon that seemed to suck his cheek dry. She licked up each drop in a kind of ecstasy.
He desperately hoped Arithel or Fallon would arrive and end this madness. The old woman was clearly a witch like his mother had been. Who knew what she had in store for him? He didn’t want to die. He wanted to learn more of this prophecy and why his blood was so valuable. He couldn’t even think of Agron anymore, all he could think of were Elspeth’s words about destiny. He had always known he was more than just a farmer!
Elspeth tugged on the handle of a trapdoor hidden beneath a rug. With unnatural strength, she dragged his body across the floor and down the stairs to a hidden crawlspace. He was glad he was paralyzed. Otherwise it would have hurt to get so carelessly banged up.
The basement was dark, but he could see the glistening shells of beetles crawling across the dirt and the silhouettes of bones piled in the shadows. A rotting scent wafted past his nostrils but was soon overpowered by the flowers and mistletoe hanging from hooks set into the underside of the floorboards. They smelled nice, but made his nose itch. The itching was the most hellish part of the entire experience thus far, for he could do nothing to relieve it. It was worse than the after-taste from the old woman’s kiss, worse even than her jagged fingernails tearing at his face.
Elspeth positioned his body so that he was sitting upright in a corner. His neck shifted sideways, into an awkward position that would probably leave him rather sore if he survived. Elspeth sauntered back up the stairs. The last thing her candle illuminated was the body of a young woman lying on the other side of the room. The girl’s hair was splayed out like a fan, and she was curled into a fetal position. He could not tell if she was dead or alive, but her presence was strangely uplifting nonetheless.
Elspeth closed the trapdoor and Darren was plunged into a terrifying blackness. He pleaded with Agron that this dirty hole would not be his coffin.
Chapter Twelve
It was eerily quiet as Arithel ventured back inside Wearywindle. She had expected to see Elspeth and Darren playing games in the living room, but nobody was there and every candle had been snuffed. A peculiar, spicy smell drifted from the kitchen, as did the sound of Elspeth’s soft singing.
Arithel thumbed the pommel of her knife. She considered retrieving her sword, but decided that was too paranoid a course of action and would likely offend their host. Regardless of any sinister feelings in the air, she’d look foolish greeting a little old lady with a drawn sword. She laughed a bit to herself; she was overreacting— no doubt she’d find saintly Darren passed out drunk.
Arithel walked halfway up the staircase to the loft.
“Darren!” she called three times. No answer.
Elspeth’s singing continued, its melody low and sweet, the words in a language Arithel had never heard, a tongue that sounded like little more than mangled, childish gibberish. The hairs on her forearms prickled. She swallowed and approached the kitchen door.
She burst through. A wall of smoke bombarded her, stinging her eyes. She waved her hands about, trying to disperse the stuff, but the thick, yellow plumes enveloped her anyway.
Elspeth was seated, calmly sipping a goblet of wine. She smiled at Arithel and raised her glass. She leaned back in her chair, and propped her right foot on the table.
“Hello, lass. I thought you’d never return,” she said in a low voice. “I wanted to apologize for what I said to you earlier. It was a bit… presumptuous is the word, I think.”
“It’s no problem, really. I… I get a bit hot-headed every now and then,” Arithel admitted. “Thank you, though, for the apology.”
Elspeth nodded. Arithel scoured the room for any sign of Darren. Why no explanation as to his whereabouts yet? Elspeth had been the last one with him. And why were there stains at the corners of her lips?
“Any reason why you decided to put out all the lights so early? I nearly tripped over my own feet walking in,” Arithel said.
Elspeth took a dainty sip of wine. “Because it’s time for bed. For all of us. The three of you are journeying, yes? You should rise with the dawn.”
Arithel narrowed her eyes. “Where’s Darren? I called for him and there was no answer.”
Elspeth shrugged as a tabby cat crawled into her lap. Where had that thing come from?
“Perhaps he is a heavy sleeper?”
The crone looked like she was stifling laughter.
“Where is Darren?” Arithel asked again, clutching the hilt of her knife. “I know he didn’t just disappear into thin air.”
“Go look in the cupboard.”
Elspeth laughed so hard she nearly fell out of her chair.
“Tell me where he is. What the hell did you say—or do—to him?”
“I turned him into a newt to help patrol my gardens.” Elspeth giggled.
“Look, lady, this is your last chance to tell me. Or else! I mean it!” Arithel warned and drew her knife. She leaned over the table so that the point of her blade was just inches from Elspeth’s nose.
Elspeth didn’t flinch.
“I never saw a third traveler here. Soon enough, I’ll never have seen a second,” Elspeth spat. She tossed her cat onto the floor. It screeched as it landed on its paws and deftly scrambled away. Arithel’s hand trembled; uncertainty washed over her body. How exactly had the tiny old woman disposed of Darren?
Elspeth’s eyes were cold and unblinking. Arithel searched for an appropriate response to the threat. Her mouth became dry. For some reason, she was far more terrified than she had been during the encounter with the raiders. No surge of adrenaline came to her rescue and her palms became sweaty. She hesitantly edged her knife closer to the crone’s defiant, wrinkled face. An alarming realization struck Arithel; the old woman now had two perfectly functional eyes.
“What happened to your eye patch?” Arithel croaked, gripping her knife tighter.
“Curious girl. Drink this and you’ll see. I can show you a lot; everything you’ve always wished to know.”
Arithel snorted and glanced down at the wine goblet. Though it was dark, she could see the inside of the cup was streaked with blood. She swallowed. There was no doubt from whom the blood had come.
“Tell me what you did to Darren, or I swear to Agron, I’ll carve your eyes right out of your skull.”
“That won’t accomplish anything. Your golden friend is safe, for now. Drink the wine and I’ll release him.” Elspeth offered the cup again.
“You think I’m stupid? It’s poisoned, right?”
Elspeth shook her head.
“You’ll pay for your sins, for your carelessness, for the treasures you’ve stolen from innocents,” she hissed as she pointed directly at Arithel’s necklace, though it was mostly hidden by her blouse.
Arithel’s jaw dropped and she reflexively put her hand over the shape of the stone. She peered into the cup again. The dark liquid bubbled as if it were boiling. Steam rose from the wine. Beads of sweat rolled down Arithel’s brow.
When she looked back up, she was horrified to see the changeling woman sitting in Elspeth’s place. Enormous, pupil-less eyes stared at her, their inhuman and utter blackness like a never-ending abyss. Her hair was arranged into dozens of dark braids, wet and stuck to the sides of her hollow face. Her skin was the consistency and color of mottled stone, streaked with silver veins that writhed and moved like worms trapped inside a shell. Her nose was little more than two slits in her face, her ears came to a fine point, and her lips were a thin line, too small to contain her slimy, eel-like teeth. She was disgustingly naked, her only adornment a gleaming white jewel lodged in her chest. The jewel looked exactly like the one Arithel had taken, only much larger and brighter in appearance, stuck in the sternum instead of between the collarbones. Arithel was in such shock that it was impossible to move or say anything at all.
The changeling stood up, her willowy form swaying under the weight of her great head. She was so tall that she had to tilt sideways to keep from bumping the ceiling.
