Echoes of the Fourth Magic tcoya-1

by R. A. Salvatore

  Del thought he had prepared for this moment, but when he saw her now, wearing a white gossamer gown, her blond hair hanging loosely about her shoulders and her green eyes ablaze with the light of the morning sun, he was truly overwhelmed.

  “And ye’ve been looking for me long?” she asked.

  Forever, Del thought, only managing to stammer out, “Four days.”

  “All ye needed do was tell it to the wind,” she said.

  “The wind?”

  “Ayuh,” Brielle answered. “If ye speak out yer thoughts in me wood, I shall hear.”

  Del realized then that in the days he had spent in the wood, he had not mentioned Brielle’s name at all. Despite his nervousness, or perhaps because of it, he began to laugh.

  Brielle responded with a polite smile, though she didn’t quite understand what he found so humorous. Then she saw the blood on Del’s sleeve and quickly and determinedly took hold of his arm, turning it so she could better inspect the wound.

  “Ye’ve hurt yerself.”

  “It’s nothing,” Del replied, and he pulled away from her, embarrassed by the injury and by his stupidity for letting it happen in the first place. “Just a scratch.”

  “A wee bit more than a scratch, me eyes say to me,” Brielle scolded sarcastically, making it clear to Del that he was behaving like a child and she would treat him accordingly. Del recognized the insult and admitted that she was right; the cut should at least be cleaned and dressed. He nearly laughed again at her suddenly motherly tone.

  “Come,” she said, extending her hand, more of a demand than a request. “I will tend to it.”

  “Yes, Mommy,” Del mumbled under his breath.

  Brielle eyed him sharply. “Must I tell ye again that in me woods yer words reach me ears?” But her wrath was feigned and Del recognized the smile behind her scowl. This time he did laugh out loud, and Brielle joined him.

  She led him to a small hillside of soft grass and scattered flowers, topped by a thick row of lilac bushes. She bid him to wait and skipped away under the shadows of the trees.

  Del lay back on the slope, letting the sun warm him as he tried to sort out the jumble of emotions playing through him. In truth, he didn’t know what he was feeling, recognizing only that when he looked at Brielle he was both calmed and excited. It amazed him how comfortable he felt with her, at how quickly the first-meeting jitters had faded away-for both of them, it seemed. And yet when he looked at her, he consciously had to remember to breathe and his voice threatened to crack with every syllable. Above the confusion, Del understood one thing for certain: He was happy. Just looking at the Emerald Witch of Avalon thrilled him like never before.

  Brielle soon returned to the hillock bearing a small wooden bowl filled with a muddy paste, pungently sweet, like the essences of all the aromas of springtime blended together. She explained to Del that it would cleanse his wound and help it to heal, and his arm felt better as soon as she put it on.

  The two sat in silence on the grass, letting the sounds and workings of the awakening wood drift by them like the lazy clouds overhead. The witch seemed content and at ease, the serenity and natural order of this land was her strength and her magic. After a few minutes, though, Del began to grow edgy, his eyes drawn more and more toward Brielle. He became self-conscious of the silence, wondering if Brielle expected him to start a conversation. Though he wanted to say something, everything he could think of, like mentioning the beautiful weather, seemed a ridiculous cliche.

  Brielle looked at him then, and caught his gaze with her own. Still she sat smiling, relaxed and at peace, while all thoughts of comfort had flown from Del. He could hear his heart racing and was certain against reason that Brielle could as well; though she could have guessed it easily anyway by the flush in his face. To further Del’s horror, he felt the sweat beading on his forehead.

  Finally he had to turn away. He glanced all around nervously, feeling more like a fool with every passing second and praying for some distraction to bail him out of this awkward fit. “How about some lunch?” he blurted on a sudden impulse when he noticed that the sun was directly overhead. He lunged for his pack, after some time finally managing to fumble out one of the biscuits, and offered it to Brielle. She accepted it with curiosity, if not enthusiasm, and after one small bite handed it back to him.

  “ ’Tis food for the hungry,” she said. “Pray wait for me here and I’ll bring to ye food for the happy!” She tossed her mane and laughed and disappeared into the trees.

  Del had barely realized her abrupt departure when she returned bearing a large tray laden with the offerings of Avalon: berries plump with sweetness and piles of fruits oozing juice. Del took one look at the approaching feast and dropped his biscuits to the ground.

  “Rabbit food.”

  Then Del tasted of the magic of Avalon, wholesome and delicious beyond comparison; he could feel the health and rejuvenation surging through him even as he ate. When he had finished, Brielle brought a flask filled with water like he had never tasted before-crystalline clear and icy cold from the mountain melt, it tingled all the way down.

  He felt totally refreshed after the meal, as if all of the aches and soreness had been cleansed from his body. The paste on his arm had dried to a dust, and on a hunch, contrary to all reason, he brushed it away. Sure enough, the wound had completely healed, the only sign of it a thin white line of scar.

  “Unbelievable,” Del muttered. He looked up at Brielle. “This whole thing is just unbelievable.”

  She stared back at him with no answers other than her smile.

  My God, Del thought, she’s beautiful, his very image of beauty personified. Even as he contemplated his good fortune in finding her, in being here beside her, though, he remembered Andovar’s words about the witch’s enchantment over men, and fear swept the smile from his face.

  He began cautiously, afraid to ask, yet realizing that he had to know the truth. “Someone once told me that you can be to every man what he most desires in a woman.” The witch started in surprise, caught completely off guard.

  “Is it true?” Del pressed.

  Brielle put her head down defensively and admitted, “There is such a spell.”

  It flooded through Del as the worst pain he had ever experienced, a sudden emptiness beyond anything he could imagine. He had hoped to believe that he had found that elusive love of his fantasies, the romance he had doubted even existed when he had accepted his engagement to Debby in that world so far away. Now he realized the trap. Lured by the magic of Ynis Aielle, and of this forest in particular, he had allowed his defenses to drop and had dared to dream.

  “Then all this,” he stammered, barely able to speak, “all this is an illusion, a game you play! How could you deceive me? Why-”

  “No!” Brielle insisted, and the flash in her eyes stopped Del short. Again she lowered her eyes, she, too, feeling the pangs of loneliness. The ranger had spoken truly; often men had viewed her from afar only to see their most heartfelt desires, but that was merely a consequence of the honesty and purity of the wood. Perhaps an illusion, but more a glimpse of their own innate longing to live under such an innocent and naturally ordered existence. In her symbiosis with Avalon, Brielle became an extension of the wood, as it was extension of her. And that was her trap, an unforeseen pitfall of being such an image to the world outside her domain. For now she had met a man she might truly care for, and she wanted to be more to him than a fleeting vision in the starlight. Yet how could he trust her? How could he believe in the substance behind the image?

  “I’ve no’ deceived ye,” she said softly, her voice shaky and nervous, showing that she, too, considered this a critical juncture. “Ye huv me word, I am as I appear to ye.”

  Far above any doubts he could have, Del knew that there was no lie in the mist in her eyes, for he had truly hurt her with his accusation. His smile returned tenfold.

  “Can ye no’ understand?” she pleaded, apparently unable to interpret his expression.
“Ye alone see me as truly I be. Even were I to spin the spell ye speak of this very moment, I would appear no different to ye, for I promise ye that ye’re under no enchantment.”

  But Brielle was wrong. Del was indeed under her spell, and it grew with every word she spoke and every smile she showed him. It deepened each time she tossed her golden mane carelessly about her shoulders, or lifted her face to catch the warmth of the sun, or twirled about in the free air of the unblemished wood. He was held by the only magic that had remained in his world before Aielle, the only magic that had survived under the smothering blanket of exact sciences and precise technology. Del was in love, and the ten days he spent in Avalon with Brielle were the best he had ever known.

  During the hours of daylight, Brielle showed Del a new way of looking at the world. She awakened his senses and heightened the interaction between them, intensifying those mysterious emotions he had been experiencing since that morning on the raft of his first Aiellian sunrise. Brielle helped Del to refine those feelings and understand them, to bring his awareness to new heights of enjoyment. Now, a mere fragrance on the wind could direct Del’s eyes to a solitary wildflower, hidden amidst a nest of mossy gray stones. His trained vision translated the flower’s texture to his sense of touch, showing him every groove and bend, the softness of the petals and the thorny stem. And what wonderful music the wind played across such an intricate surface! Inaudible to the human ear, of course, but Del, in his melding with the flower, felt every vibration keenly. And thus it went, so that what once would have been just a pleasant forest smell had become to Del a complete experience.

  Together they observed the animals, and Brielle taught Del to emulate their fluid and balanced motions. His muscles worked in true conjunction, expanding the limitations of his mortal form to levels far beyond his imagination. He felt free, with a sense of rightness and health.

  By night, they danced under the stars and Brielle sang to Del songs of beauty and mystery, often in the same strange tongue he had heard among the elves. Ancient and melodic, known to the Four and taught to the elves by Ardaz, it was the song of the angels, the rhythms of the galaxies. Del joined in when he could, and though he had never before been able to carry a tune, in Avalon his voice rang clear and strong.

  Thoughts of leaving the forest never entered Del’s mind. This was his home now, and this was the woman with whom he would spend eternity. But events of the world don’t often allow for such plans, as Del would soon realize.

  It was early in the day, the first fingers of the sun stretching out through the thinning mist and the trees. Del, just awakened, was sitting in a patch of bedewed clover in the same pine-bordered field on which he had first viewed the dancing Brielle three weeks previous. He was waiting for her now, to come to him as she did every morning. Sure enough, flashing the familiar smile that rivaled any dawn, the witch of Avalon soon skipped across the grass.

  “Good morning,” Del called out to her.

  “Oh, but it is!” Brielle laughed, and she twirled and danced up to Del and floated down into the clover beside him.

  She stared deeply at Del. He was in her thoughts all the time now, as long-forgotten feelings began to stir within her.

  Del sensed her vulnerability; all his feelings of insecurity had been left far behind in the joy of the previous days and he knew now that she shared his love. He moved closer to her; the time had come for them to share their first kiss.

  Suddenly Brielle pulled away from him and sprang to her feet, her expression changing to shock and then anger.

  Del fell back, stunned and wondering what he had done wrong, for he, unlike the witch, did not hear a tree cry out in pain.

  She stood motionless with her eyes closed, focusing on the breach that threatened her domain.

  How? she wondered as the picture came clear. She knew the answer when she looked upon Del, knew that she had gotten careless.

  A distraction had come into her life.

  “Ye must be leaving,” Brielle stammered, realizing and accepting her responsibility. She continued quickly, before Del could argue, knowing that a protest from him could break her resolve. “Go, I say. Get ye back to Lochsilinilume and do’no’ return!”

  “What are you talking about?” Del cried.

  “Go!” Brielle commanded in a tone that drove the words from Del’s lips. Del reasoned that she was using some spell to silence him and wanted to resist, but the fire in her eyes was genuine and he knew better than to argue. He squinted to hold back the tears as he watched her crossing the field.

  She turned back to him when she got to the pines and whispered, “Sorry, I am.”

  Del heard her, though he was far away, for a sudden breeze came up and carried the words to his ears.

  Then she was gone and Del had no recourse except to follow her wishes. Throwing up an emotional shield of anger, he marched from the field and through the trees, trampling as direct a route to Mountaingate as he could figure. He couldn’t sustain the defense, though, and gradually his line began to waver. He was reeling emotionally, hurt and above all confused, for Brielle had stung him to the core of his heart, had dropped him in a breath from his highest peak to his lowest valley, and still he could not deny his true feelings for her or for this wonderful forest. He loved her and no pretense of anger could change that. His pace slowed and his course meandered, like a condemned man clinging to the last minutes of his life and praying for a reprieve.

  The fragrance of lilacs led him to the small hill where he and Brielle had shared their first lunch. Del started up, lost in the memory of that pleasant morn. He had nearly reached the top before he heard gruff voices coming from the other side. Startled to caution, he ducked down and crept to the bushes.

  A small wagon sat motionless on the path below him. His first thought was that some of the rangers were about, but when he noticed the horse hitched to the wagon, he quickly dismissed that theory. Beaten and half starved, it could hardly lift its head for lack of spirit and strength, and Del knew that no ranger would treat any animal that way. He realized then that something was wrong, though he couldn’t have imagined how very wrong until, from a group of trees, pushing and grumbling with every step, appeared a band of talons!

  Five of them, each with an armload of freshly cut wood, moved toward the wagon, the largest wielding a great ax and shoving the others. Unclean and loathsome, they stained the beautiful forest with their mere presence, and Del barely caught himself from crying out in dismay.

  “Do something,” he whispered to the wind. “Someone get them out of here.” As if in answer to his plea, a large raccoon crept out of the brush on the far side of the road. It hopped up on the horse’s back and began gnawing on the reins. The talons, busy with their arguing, took no notice of it. Although the horse was freed within seconds, it remained in place, showing a level of discipline and intelligence. Not until the raccoon was safely back in the brush did it bolt away.

  The talons let out a howl and gave chase, but the horse ran with the taste of freedom blowing in its face and had no intentions of being caught by its wicked masters. Del watched with satisfaction as the miserable creatures returned, pushing and arguing tenfold, each blaming another and threatening some horrible punishment.

  Then something else caught Del’s eye-Brielle on a distant hill across the road. She danced about, beautiful and terrible all at once, gathering power with every move and reaching for the sky. Del followed the line of her arms upward and saw the thunderclouds. He looked back to the witch, beckoning to the rising storm, menacing and distinct in her white gown against the darkening sky.

  The talons hushed when the sun disappeared, their arguing drowned away by the angry rumble of witching magic. Del nearly pitied them, they were so terrified, for they knew their fate was at hand. In a pathetic attempt to escape, they jostled about and tried to break free from each other and away from the wagon.

  They had no chance. Even as they started, a bolt of lightning sizzled down from the clouds. De
l covered his head and lay as flat and still as he could. Blast after blast exploded and crackled, and the thunder rolled on and on, shaking the very earth beneath him.

  When all was quiet, Del looked with horror upon the splintered remains of the wagon and the charred, smoking bodies of the intruders.

  Then a small twister whistled in just above the trees, not too far from Del. Unafraid, he understood now that this fury was perfectly aimed. The whirlwind swept down upon the road and sucked up every trace of the infection that had invaded Avalon, carrying it far, far away from the fair wood and back to the desolated land of Brogg.

  Panting for breath and fighting against a wave of nausea, Del looked back at the witch. She stood calm now, untroubled, as if she could not see the blood that was on her hands. And as the clouds began to break away, their mission complete, a ray of sunlight descended upon her, lining her form in silvery approval.

  The emerald in her forehead sparkled.

  “My God,” Del whispered. In his own abhorrence of violence, he painted the same face on Brielle now that he had seen on Mitchell that day on the beach. But Mitchell’s rifle seemed a toy compared to the incredible power the witch had conjured. In Avalon, Del had viewed the creations of Brielle’s magic, and he had loved her even more for them. He had never imagined that she could turn that same wonderful ability into such a force of destruction.

  Though her brightened form was blurred to him through the tears that had welled in his eyes, Del could see that Brielle stood at peace, grimly satisfied. Weakened by confusion and despair, he stumbled down to the road toward Mountaingate.

  Soon he broke into a dead run.

  Chapter 18

  Caer Tuatha