by JL Bryan
Chapter Eighteen
It was dark over the town of Glastonbury, the deep, brooding clouds smothering the light of the moon and stars. From the top of the lone hill, the dark plains of Somerset stretched away into the night. The only sound was a drum circle of hippies near the base of the hill.
A roofless rock tower, three stories high, sat atop the hill, with two doorless archways facing each other so wind and people could pass right through. The floor was worn stone, the tiles cracked and aged with time. One of these tiles had risen up and tilted back like the lid of a trap door, revealing a squarish hole in the floor.
The elf named Hokealussiplatytorpinquarnartnuppy Melaerasmussanatolinkarrutorpicus Darnathiopockettlenocbiliotroporiqqua Bellefrost raised his head out of the floor hole and gazed out at the dark expanse beyond the archway. He looked up at the dark sky above the tower, then back at the archway behind him. So far, there was no sign of a guardian, but appearances could deceive.
He climbed out onto the floor of the roofless tower. The unicorn's pink horn and mane rose from the hole behind him, and she turned her head from one side to the other, taking in the scene with watchful, chocolate-drop eyes.
“Stay there, Buttercake,” Hoke whispered. “I'll check for a guard.”
Hoke walked out through one archway. A single ribbon of concrete stretched from the ruins of the tower down to the lowlands beneath it. The rest of the hill was blank, covered in grass.
Hoke shook his head as he walked a complete circle around the tower. The place had changed a great deal since the last time he was here. It looked uninhabited, maybe even unguarded, but Hoke kept his hand on his belt anyway. Pouches of combat herbs and a sharp, sheathed flint blade lay within easy reach.
He stepped back into the archway where he'd begun.
“Come along, Buttercake,” he said. The unicorn emerged cautiously, swishing her pink tail, and eased toward him. “Don't forget to shut the door,” Hoke added.
Buttercake snorted. She walked back and kicked the stone tile, and it moved back into place.
“Good girl,” Hoke said. He scratched her mane as she joined him in the doorway. She turned her head to nuzzle his hand.
They walked out onto the concrete path and started down the hill at an easy pace.
“I don't suppose you've been to man-world, have you?” Hoke asked.
Buttercake neighed.
“And you're too young to remember the wars,” Hoke said. “You wouldn't believe me, but this very place where you're clomping was once a large city of fairies. Maybe the largest.”
Buttercake made a blowing sound and shook her head.
“Oh, yes,” Hoke said. “Down there, those grassy terraces? Each one was a street more crowded than any thoroughfare in Sidhe City. All manner of Folk were welcome here—fairies, elves, ‘chauns and gnomes, all in peace together. It was called Ynys yr Afalon. In time, just 'Avalon,' because everyone likes to shorten things. That was in the time of Mad Mab's grandfather, the good fairy king Gwynn ap Nudd. Many thousands of years gone,” Hoke sighed. Seeing the place so empty made his heart ache. The world had once been very different, and kinder.
Buttercake stopped and sniffed the grass by the walkway.
“Smell the residual magic everywhere, don't you?” Hoke asked. He looked out over the lowlands again. “The hill used to be an island in the sea. Then a lake. ‘Course, the fairies took everything after the Iron Wars, took the other layer of this hill, the whole city, Avalon—that's the Old Town Quarter in Sidhe City, now.”
Buttercake gave him a questioning whinny and resumed walking. The path ran along a shallow slope of the hill, so it was a longer route than if they'd walked down one of the steep sides.
“It's hard to explain,” Hoke answered. “Humans and Folk lived in peace for as long as anyone remembers. Then the humans began attacking us with iron, taking our land, so we all fled together.”
Buttercake gave a sad, soft blow.
“It is unfortunate,” Hoke agreed. “But humans are about as trustworthy as fairies. That's why I like the swamp, just me and you cornhorses. Nobody bothers us.”
They were halfway down the hill now, slowly approaching the ring of humans beating their drums.
“We'd better get out of sight,” Hoke said. He hopped on the unicorn's back, stroking her neck. Thousands of little sparkles gleamed in her pink horn, and then the elf and the unicorn turned invisible together. Buttercake stepped off the path to walk quietly in the grass, so her cloven hooves didn't ring on the concrete.
The humans in the drum circle were a mingling of males and females, a range of ages. They all had quite long hair, many of them twisted into thick braids or dreadlocks. Some of them were singing.
They reminded him, strangely, of the primitive, friendly humans from the Age of Flint, before the horrible Age of Iron. Of course, you couldn't believe anything you saw among the humans. Their world was full of illusions.
One of the drummers stood up and stretched. He had thick gray dreadlocks, a grizzled beard, tired-looking eyes. His airbrushed t-shirt read “Ask me about Glastonbury Tours!”
Hoke touched the back of Buttercake's neck. She stopped walking and stood still.
The dreadlocked man staggered away from the group of drummers as if drunk. Once he was several paces away from them, however, he stood up straight and walked with purpose. His eyes scanned along the concrete path, up the rocky hill to the tower at the top. Hoke held his breath.
The man's eyes turned solid black. His jaw opened, revealing teeth that were suddenly long and sharp, almost too big for his mouth. Then a forked tongue uncoiled between his teeth and reached out until it was longer than his arms. The tongue swirled in the air, tasting it like a snake.
It had to be the guardian, Hoke thought. And he didn't have the hexagonal gold and black medallion to indicate he was on official business for Queen Mab. He was on unofficial business, so he couldn't reveal a thing to the guardian. The Queen clearly wanted the missing magical instruments kept quiet. That was probably why she'd hired a solitary elf like Hoke, who wouldn't be spreading the story to anyone, except maybe some giant sugarcane trees.
Hoke felt Buttercake tense beneath him, afraid. He rubbed her between the shoulders to try and calm her.
The Queen enforced the Supreme Law, or at least the part forbidding anyone from Faerie from crossing into man-world. To this end, she appointed darkfae to guard the doors between the worlds. These were fairies who'd been twisted into evil, wicked things, usually by too much exposure to black magic. Trolls, boggarts, dullahans...nasty things.
The creature currently approaching him was known as a boggart, known for being unstable and very violent. Apparently, it kept itself disguised among the humans in order to keep an eye on the gate.
The boggart spun its long tongue through the air again. Then it sucked the tongue back inside, and its teeth shrunk a little, though they remained much longer and sharper than a human's.
“Who's out there, then?” the boggart asked.
Hoke and Buttercup remained still and quiet.
“The Glastonbury Door is closed,” the boggart with gray dreadlocks said. “Queen's Law. No Folk out, no tallboys in.” He stalked up the hill, sniffing the air with his tongue again. “Who's being naughty? Goblin? Elf? Smells like elf to me.”
Hoke tapped Buttercup's right side. She turned to the right and started down the slope, away from the concrete path where the boggart was walking.
“I am the guardian of the gate, appointed by the Queensguard,” the boggart hissed as he climbed. “You go back as you came, or we'll give you the iron.” He drew a long dagger from inside his high leather boot.
Hoke gave Buttercake three quick taps, and the unicorn hurried down the slope.
The boggart continued up the path, past the point where Hoke and Buttercake had turned away. It stopped after a few steps and unfurled its tongue to its full length, tasting the air a
gain.
“Oh, aren't we a clever one?” the boggart asked as he backtracked. The tips of his forked tongue brushed the grass near his feet, just where Buttercake had stepped off. The boggart followed, moving directly toward them now. He'd picked up their scent.
Hoke took a pouch from his belt and opened the drawstring. It held sneezewort leaves, dried and crushed into a powder. Unfortunately, it was even drier and older than he expected, and a small puff of dust curled out and floated up to his nostrils.
Hoke sneezed, not just once, but a dozen times in a row, each one echoing like a thunderclap inside his nose. He felt Buttercake tense up beneath him, her muscles swelling. She was about to panic.
When Hoke finally managed to stop sneezing and open his itchy, tear-filled eyes, he saw the blurry shape of the boggart charging at them, teeth extended to full length, iron dagger raised and ready to strike.
Hoke rubbed Buttercake to sooth her, and with his other hand, he readied the pouch of sneezewort.
“Ha! You're more sneezy than sneaky, then!” the boggart crowed as he approached. His tongue lashed the air all around Hoke and Buttercake. “I smell a naughty elf, and...what's this? A griffin? A dragon? Or, perhaps...”
Hoke dashed the sneezewort at the boggart. The dried powder rolled out in a big cloud, coating the entire length of the boggart's tongue.
“What's this?” the boggart managed to say, before he fell into a severe sneezing and coughing fit. He rolled his tongue back inside his mouth, but this only made things worse. The boggart fell on the ground, his gray dreadlocks flailing as he sneezed and wheezed and rolled on the ground, scratching at his nose and mouth.
“Go!” Hoke shouted, squeezing Buttercake with his knees. “Fast as you can!”
Buttercake raced downhill, picking up speed, and Hoke clung tight to her neck. They shot invisibly past the drum circle, some of whom looked up at the mysterious breeze passing by.
Before she hit the flat land below the hill, Buttercake leaped into the air. The unicorn floated in a long, slow arc and landed well out in the plains. She jumped again, and they drifted over a farmhouse and a few low stone walls before landing.
With a third leap, they put the rocky hill of Glastonbury Tor, and its boggart guardian, far behind them.
“That's a good girl,” Hoke said. “I don't suppose you've got a sniff of the magic instruments yet, have you?”
Buttercake neighed.
“That's all right,” Hoke said. “Let's stop and swipe a few apples from the orchard up there, and you can sniff all you like.”
As Buttercake walked, she drifted slightly to the west, as if she sensed something in that direction. Perhaps the instruments were somewhere near Exeter, or Plymouth, or across the sea in Ireland. Or perhaps the Americas, in which case Hoke hadn't picked the best gate to man-world, after all.
Hoke stroked her pink mane. Wherever the instruments were, Buttercake would root them out. Unicorns were good for much more than just running and hiding, though they excelled at those, too.