Redinkle closed her eyes. She’d learned to sense fire helping Pernach with the charcoal burns. Now she felt below the flames. Wood waiting to be hotter before it burned. Wood wanting more oxygen. Water soaking up heat that could have ignited wood.
She began to sort. Push water aside. Force heat into wood. Split the grain to let in air.
“Good. It’s brightening. Don’t spend yourself. Make the fire do the work.”
Redinkle realized she could draw on the energy of the flame. That cooled the fire for an instant, but came back with a profit as split dry wood combusted.
Now she could feel the heat with her skin as well as her magic. Then it went away. The log was ash.
Redinkle opened her eyes. Her fire had been less neat. The ash spread wider and the color varied among multiple shades of grey. But the wood had burned up completely.
“Let us give this Master Forge his hot fire,” said Aelion.
The blacksmith looked dubious as the elf dumped an armload of wood into the hearth box. The open-topped steel cube had been swept clean of ash by the apprentices.
“It’s fire magic,” explained Redinkle. “The wood can burn hotter than charcoal with the right spell.”
“That wood hasn’t even had time to season,” said Master Forge. “It’s as green as a growing tree. But I won’t argue with you.”
Forge’s apprentices cleared away the practice pieces they’d been cold-working. Other projects waiting on the charcoal delivery were brought up.
Redinkle closed her eyes to focus on the wood. The rings laid down each year were like wrapped sheets of paper, ready to peel away from each other. The water was held like a sponge, saturating everywhere. Of the trinity of fuel and air and heat only fuel was present in quantity. Air was locked outside.
“Step back,” she said.
She ignited the wood. The flames were only a cool red. All energy beyond that she shifted from the fire to the wood. Water needed to leave as water, not turned into steam. She squeezed the sponge, water moving down through the wood, droplets falling from the underside of the split logs.
The structure resisted the movement. She began peeling the layers apart. The logs expanded. As air came in the water flowed through the gaps. Redinkle realized she should have started with that.
“Mighty cool fire,” muttered Master Forge.
Peeling layers burst into flame. Redinkle seized the energy to dry and shatter the rest of the wood. A puddle formed on the floor of the hearth box, unseen by everyone.
She released the flames. They flared up with their full energy. The fire spread through the wood, peeled layers allowing air everywhere.
“Holy mother of God!” cried the blacksmith.
Heat struck her skin. Redinkle took a step back. Fire spread through all the logs in the stack, consuming them.
“Douse it! Douse it! Stop it, girl, stop!”
The fire swelled, far hotter than what she’d done before. The flames were bright enough to hurt through closed eyelids.
Then the ground smacked her back and head. Her concentration shattered. Redinkle opened her eyes.
She saw Aelion slap Master Forge hard enough to lay him flat. “How dare you strike my student!”
Sitting up she saw two apprentices pour buckets of water into the hearth box. A third plunged steam-scalded hands into the trough.
“Aelion, leave him be,” she cried. “It’s all right.”
The elf set Redinkle back on her feet. The blacksmith stood more slowly. He looked at the ripples newly-formed in the side of the hearth box.
“My lady, I thank you for your efforts,” said Master Forge. “I will call upon you if we plan to make cast iron. For wrought iron we’ll stick to charcoal, if you please.”
***
A summons to see the Autocrat privately did not seem to be good news to either Goldenrod or Newman. Arriving to find King Ironhelm as the other person in the tent made it worse.
The older men exerted themselves to put the couple at ease. Herbal tea and sweet berries were served. The king offered amusing anecdotes from his younger days, matched by Autocrat Sharpquill.
Newman shared a funny story of cultural misunderstanding from when he was deployed overseas and wondered what they wanted.
Master Sharpquill finally turned serious. “Our new friend has shared the local calendar with us. Winter starts in five months. It will last four. We’re running a food surplus now but that’s not much time to build up a stockpile.”
“We still have some people below a healthy weight,” put in King Ironhelm.
“The river will partially freeze over. So collecting fish will be dangerous. Same for hunting. Gathering will be impossible until the spring growth.”
Newman and Goldenrod held hands. The constant fear for survival had faded. Now they felt it again.
“We also need to build shelters that can handle the winter.” Sharpquill waved at the ridgepole of his tent. “This handles thunderstorms well enough but I don’t want to endure a blizzard in it.”
“Which means pulling people off of gathering and preserving food.”
“As His Majesty says. So we will have to do something drastic to get enough food for the winter.”
Goldenrod asked, “In addition to the vineroot farm?”
“That might serve. If everything goes as we hope. What we want to do is go outside the box. Trade for food.”
“With the elves?” asked Newman.
“Exactly. We’ve surprised Aelion plenty of times. We need to find what we can offer his people. Tools, electronics, labor. Whatever it takes to get the food we need.”
Newman stiffened. “Labor? Sell them slaves?”
King Ironhelm snapped, “Of course not.”
“Doing a project for them, or having some volunteers work six month indentures, might be acceptable,” said the Autocrat. “Whoever we send will have to make the best bargain possible.”
“Who’s getting sent?” asked Newman grimly.
“You two, of course,” said Autocrat Sharpquill.
King Ironhelm leaned forward. “You’ve established a solid working relationship with Aelion.” His eyes moved to Newman. “You were the first to talk to him. And you have experience dealing with different mindsets. You two might not be perfect for the job but we don’t have anyone better.”
“Counter-insurgency duty isn’t diplomacy,” said Newman.
“No. But everyone I’ve talked to in my life has been part of a Western industrialized society or an immigrant trying to adapt. You understand at gut-level there are other mindsets.”
“Won’t some people object to us getting the job?” asked Goldenrod.
Sharpquill answered, “We’re describing it to them as a difficult and dangerous mission you might not come back from. Your enemies are just fine with that.”
“When you return with the agreement we need,” added the king, “there’ll be no trouble getting you the honors you deserve.”
Newman noted that returning without an agreement wasn’t considered. He met Goldenrod’s eyes. They both nodded.
“We accept, Your Majesty,” said Goldenrod.
“Then you are Our Royal Ambassadors,” said King Ironhelm.
“Has anyone talked to Aelion about this expedition?” asked Newman.
“That,” said the Autocrat, “will be your first task.”
Aelion had developed the habit of dining with whichever mage he’d tutored that afternoon. Fortunately for the ambassadors he’d been showing bird tricks to Marjoram. She ate at the common pavilion, her family being too small to count as a ‘household’ for wood and food rations. Not being pleased with the commons fare he’d skipped it in favor of a visit to House Applesmile.
The rest of the household had been asked to make room for a private chat. Only Goldenrod and Newman sat down at the table with the elf.
“Good evening,” he said.
They greeted him. Newman led off. “We’d like to visit your people.”
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p; “Why? It’s nice here.”
They’d discussed approaches earlier. Bluntness seemed safest. “We don’t think we’ll have enough food for the winter. We want to trade with them for more food.”
“Oh. That makes sense.”
“Would you be our guide to them?”
“Oh, no. I can’t go back there.”
The ambassadors exchanged a look. “Have you been exiled?” asked Goldenrod.
“Not an official exile. It’s just that there’s elves who’d kill me if I go back.”
Goldenrod didn’t seem up to tackling that one.
Newman asked, “Why?”
Aelion’s normally haughty face turned to unprecedented dejection. “I don’t like to tell the story.”
“I can sympathize with that. There’s a story I’ve never told anyone here. But we need more food to survive the winter.”
The elf let out a long sigh.
Newman said nothing. When Goldenrod seemed about to say something he waved her to silence. At last the elf started talking.
“A visitor from another village taught my wife a new song. She liked it. She’d sing it every day. I liked it too. I liked it the first few hundred times she sang it.
“But she kept singing it. After two thousand times it irritated me. Another thousand and I hated it.”
Newman said, “She kept singing it all the time?”
“No, no. Once or twice a day. But that adds up in a decade. I started interrupting her and yelling at her but she’d just sing louder. So . . .”
Aelion stared off into the distance. “So I told her if she sang it ten thousand more times I’d kill her. She believed me. Would only sing it twice a week. By then just the first four notes would make me clench my teeth. The second century of our marriage went by with me counting up. Half the village was making bets over whether I’d do it.
“Then she sang it the ten thousandth time. Staring at me the whole time with a smirk. Like she didn’t think I’d have the guts. I grabbed her head in both hands and snapped her neck. No magic can fix that. Grabbed my pack and bow and ran. Been wandering ever since.”
Goldenrod was horrified. Newman asked, “Did anyone try to arrest you?”
“Hold me? No. Her relatives would have killed me. My family said they’d kill anyone who hurt me, but no one wanted to spend time protecting me.”
“How long has it been?”
“Century and a half. So they’re all still around except maybe her grandpa.”
Newman thought a moment. “So you can go back. You just need to be protected.”
“Yeah. Don’t really want to though.”
“If you help us make a deal to get enough food for the winter then I promise you’ll always be welcome here. All the food and shelter you need, forever. And we’ll protect you against anyone who comes looking for you.”
“Okay. I’ll take you there.”
***
“Why me?” asked Deadeye.
“My wife is going to be far from home, surrounded by strangers who might decide to hate us,” said Newman. “If it hits the fan I want the most competent fighter I can find keeping her safe. No matter how much of an asshole he is.”
“Dude, you’re gonna make me blush.”
“Are you in?”
“No way I’ll pass up the first chance to see hot elf chicks. Who else do we have?”
“Me, Goldenrod, Aelion, and Verbena, who’s one of Queen Dahlia’s ladies in waiting. Don’t know her but she’s a new talent. Can heal small cuts. Also used to live in Indonesia so she can handle strange cultures.”
“Useful. Hopefully Aelion can teach her to fix big ones on the trip. Or we can just not get cut.”
“Let’s pray for that.”
“Who else have we got?”
“That’s all. I want you to find three or four more. Volunteers. Good with a bow and a blade. I have to go listen to Master Sharpquill go on about trade possibilities.” Newman rolled his eyes.
“I’ll get them.”
***
Two modern pop-up tents had been requisitioned for the expedition. Goldenrod and Verbena slept in the small one. The men not on watch took the other. Aelion, as usual, slept on a tree branch, looking as if he was about to fall but perfectly stable.
The first night Goldenrod resented being exempted from watchstanding. The second she collapsed into sleep when dinner was done. She was used to physical activity but the mile-eating pace the hunters used for hiking was something she’d only done for an hour or two at a time. Keeping it up for a whole day left her legs screaming.
Verbena was doing even worse. She’d done more gathering than most court ladies but the gatherers walked slowly out and back. Now at every rest break Verbena flopped down on the ground, only getting up to drink a little as they started the next march.
It didn’t help that she was two inches shorter than Goldenrod. Aelion was exploring his borrowed English vocabulary for all the short leg jokes he could invent.
The men on the expedition were all tall, or at least taller than Goldenrod. They still didn’t have a prayer of keeping up with Aelion. The elf would set the course than disappear into the forest. He’d reappear from a random direction, sometimes just making sure the humans were on course, other times bringing back berries or some other snack.
When the sun grew low Newman asked Aelion to guide them toward some deer. The elf did, but griped the humans would attract scavengers. Three arrows took down a medium-sized one. They gutted it in place. A sapling made a carrying pole to take the carcass along until they found a campsite.
A small fire let them cook slices on twigs. Once they were full extras were toasted for the morning. Goldenrod and Verbena collapsed in their tent, leaving clean-up for the boys.
“Setting up their tent and carrying their gear is going to get old,” Deadeye muttered to Newman.
“They’re not troops, they’re payload,” said Newman unsympathetically. “If we have to carry them on our backs to get them there, we do it.”
“That’s—”
“That’s the mission. Do you want to sweet-talk a bunch of strange elves into giving us ten tons of food?”
“No.” Deadeye looked away.
“When they’re spending all day doing diplomacy you can spend your time sleeping and ogling elf chicks. Until then, shut up and soldier.”
The next day’s hike was easier. Goldenrod suspected the hunters were slacking a bit to make it easier on Verbena. Or she was just getting used to the exercise.
Whether she’d built up strength or wasn’t having to work as hard, Verbena became chattier. Goldenrod was wary. It made sense to add someone with the lady in waiting’s skills to the expedition but that didn’t mean Goldenrod had to be friends with her.
Still, Verbena managed to turn Goldenrod’s minimally polite responses into hooks for real conversations. By the fourth night Goldenrod found herself continuing to talk as they settled in for the night instead of going straight to sleep.
She was asleep when the watchman woke her with a cry of, “Wolves! Wolves!”
Goldenrod drew the Bowie knife Newman had commissioned for her as a wedding present. She looked out the mesh window of the tent. No wolves. The moonlight showed her the six-man tent, two hunters stretching its doorway wide as they tried to force their way out at the same time.
Newman’s voice came from inside. “Take turns, dammit! Right side, then left side. Right side, left side.”
The hunters squeezed out as a wolf was on the sentry. He screamed as jaws closed on his arm. Newman came out last, holding the lochaber axe low to the ground.
“Form line!” ordered Newman.
A wolf leapt at him and yipped as its nose met the blade of his axe. Another knocked down the man on Newman’s left. The air filled with yells and growls. Newman brought the axe down on the spine of a wolf. The animal squealed and fell.
“Should we go help?” asked Verbena.
Goldenrod looked at her. The edges of a short
dagger gleamed in the moonlight.
“No, they don’t want us getting in the way. Just be ready in case one tries to force its way in.”
The growls changed to squeals and yips. Then the remaining wolves fled.
Newman cut through the cursing. “Sound off. Who’s hurt?”
“Fine.” “Okay.” “Nothing.” “My arm’s bleeding. We got any antiseptic?”
“I could piss on it,” said Deadeye.
“No thanks, I don’t want the clap in my arm,” said the casualty.
Goldenrod called, “We have soap.”
She unzipped the tent door and crawled out holding a crock of lye soap. Newman was rinsing the blood off Crusher’s arm. Both the top and bottom of the forearm had punctures.
Goldenrod dipped her fingertips into the crock. She smeared a bit onto a couple of punctures.
“Jesus fucking Christ!” Crusher yanked his arm away.
Goldenrod flinched. “Sorry, this stuff is rough.”
“Yeah, sorry, I should’ve expected it. I’ll hold still. Sorry. Go ahead, I don’t want it infected.”
Newman took hold of the arm at elbow and wrist to keep it steady. Goldenrod washed the wounds as quickly as she could.
Crusher hissed between clenched teeth.
“Done,” she said.
Leadsmith stepped in with a jug of water. The arm was soon rinsed and dried.
“If it’s clean I can help,” said Verbena. Goldenrod made way for her.
Verbena squeezed the arm with her hands. When she took them away the punctures were just pink dots.
“Thank you,” said Crusher.
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have gotten in your way,” said Goldenrod.
“No, it needed to be cleaned first. Lady Burnout got on me about that after I healed somebody and he got an infection from stuff caught in the wound.”
Aelion’s voice came from a few feet over their head. “I told you we’d get scavengers. Kill something, rip it open to spread the scent, then carry it bleeding to camp. I’m surprised it took this long.”
“The wolves near camp are afraid of us,” said Newman.
“Then we’ve gone far enough to find strangers.”
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