by NS Dolkart
She tried over and over to get a hold of the mesh, but it kept slipping away. Her motions were not as graceful as the elves’. Her fingers were too… too… she did not know the word. They weren’t too big, but they felt too big.
Finally, her little finger found a wrinkle. She would do it; she would open the gateway on her own! But when she tugged, she found that she was too weak to tear the mesh away. Her arms were all right – it was something else. What the others called her ‘magic’ was not strong enough. She finally understood that word now. Magic was the ears with which she listened to the wind and to Four-foot. It was the voice with which she told the plants to grow. And it was the strength that was too weak to open the gateway.
But what could she do, then? Only wait. If Criton came back to her, she would show him how to feel for the mesh, and together, maybe, they could tear off a piece. She could hope, at least.
After a time, she thought she heard the sound of horses in the distance. Empty, elvish horses. Was Criton riding one of them?
Her heart sank when the elves appeared through the trees. So Criton had lost. Criton was gone. And she might never live to see her young.
Wait! These were not Illweather’s elves. She recognized their leader as the one who had caught her in his net so many years ago. The captain of the Goodweathers. So Criton and the others might not be lost after all! Perhaps if Bandu lay still, the Goodweather elves would go away.
No such luck. The elves rode straight for her, fanning out as if expecting an attack. Their captain peered down at Bandu suspiciously. Then he smiled.
“Well, what have we here? Our own little one, whom we lost some ten years ago! What say you, brothers? Shall we thank our little troublemaker for showing us which gate the Illweathers have been using?”
Bandu could not speak. The terror of those days had come back to her all at once.
The elf captain laughed. “Very clever, as always, asking the trees for help. The slow way, the quiet way. We almost didn’t notice. But we don’t trust the trees anymore, not since Goodweather helped you escape. We had words with the castle, child, after you left us. Our Goodweather was strangely fond of you. I don’t know what the old shrub was thinking.
“You are such a wicked child,” the captain went on. “You disappeared right at the end of the window, when we could not follow you. Eleven months and eleven days after we first rescued you from the woods of your little island, you snuck out and left us without so much as a parting word!”
“You kill the others!” screamed Bandu. Why was he taunting her again? Hadn’t he done that enough, those many years ago? “You kill them and you eat them!”
“And they were delicious,” the captain agreed. “But we would not have eaten you, little one. You earned your life in the games, don’t you remember?”
The other elves guffawed and chattered their teeth. Bandu remembered them, though she had not seen much of the Goodweather Raiders after she won the games. They never spoke, because they had no tongues.
“I remember,” said Bandu.
The captain grinned. “But all is well now, because you have come back to us. And you might even provide us with a tasty little morsel, if we wait patiently.”
Bandu gasped, and the Goodweather captain laughed again. “What brings you back to us, little one?”
She felt him prying into her mind, dragging at her secrets… she felt him, and she put a wall in his way. The elf’s eyes widened, and Bandu stared him down. She was growing stronger with practice.
“My mate brings me Illweather’s seed,” she said. “If he comes, you take the seed and let us go.”
“If he comes,” said the captain, his mouth tightening, “we will butcher him before your eyes. Then we will take you back to Goodweather, so that the castle can drink your blood and suffer.”
She had thought he would say something like that. “Maybe Illweather elves come with him.”
The raiders chattered their teeth again. “After him, you mean?” smirked the captain. “I’m sure they will, if he stole their castle’s seed. When they do, we will be ready for them. We will catch them and cut them to pieces, and leave your unfortunate lover ’til the end. Or are there others? Has he gone to rescue Illweather’s prey? He has, hasn’t he? If the children come with him, they will make a most triumphant prize. To feast on Illweather’s quarry! Oh, that would be too sweet!”
The raiders clacked their teeth once more, and did not stop this time. They knew how the sound frightened her, and they relished her fear. Louder and louder they became, until Bandu could tolerate it no more.
“Stop!” she screamed, and the horses stamped and snorted with her distress. A tree root broke out of the ground at her call and tangled itself around the leg of the captain’s horse. With a mighty crack, horse and rider fell to the ground.
The elf tumbled off his horse and rose gracefully to his feet, still carrying his sickle. With a smooth motion, he snatched a sky-net out of the air and threw it over Bandu. She made to dodge, but he was too fast for her.
“You have grown,” the captain spat. “Godserfs like you should never grow.”
“Come close,” said Bandu, reaching for where Hunter’s knife lay on the ground beside her. “You should be like others, without tongue.”
The captain turned to his horse, and finding its leg broken, cut its head off. “Take up your nets,” he commanded his raiders, “and leave your horses here. We’re going to set a trap for our little one’s mate.”
They left her there, sitting and waiting for the sun to set. She could see their limbs changing as they walked away, springing twigs and leaves as their clothes turned to bark. By the time Criton and the others came back – if they ever came back – the Goodweather elves would look like nothing more than a clump of bushes. It was too much to hope that Criton would see through their disguise. He and the others would be caught, just like they had said. For the first time, she hoped her friends were being chased.
She sat there, waiting for the worst to come. The sun beat strong over the ruins. It would shine in Criton’s eyes when the elves attacked him. She began to cry. The elves had their sky-nets, and the nets would not miss. Here she was again, trapped and useless. She could not even warn him.
This was a terrible world. It was here to torture her, to make her feel stupid and weak and to take everything she loved away from her. It was teasing her, even now. The Goodweather elves had pulled their nets out of the air, just the way she had failed to do. She could not escape or even move, while all around her the mists were growing.
45
Hunter
The first net flew past him toward the pursuing elves. It had come out of a bush – he was sure of it. Had it been meant for him, or them? Hunter did not wait to find out. He turned his mount and rode hard toward whoever was hiding there in the undergrowth. He squinted against the sun. Was it just him, or was the bush itself moving? Its twigs and branches seemed to dissolve before his eyes, leaving… could that be Bandu?
No, he realized at the last moment. It was an elf. He recovered as quickly as he could and swung his sword, but the elf was too fast. He – or was it a she? – ducked his blade and with a single motion sliced off one of the horse’s hind legs. Hunter’s stomach plunged as his mount collapsed under him. Without any stirrups to entangle his feet, he managed to fall from the horse without any of his limbs getting caught underneath. He rose just barely in time to block the elf’s first blow, but the force knocked his sword from his hand. He dropped to the ground as the elf raised the sickle, and then was sprayed with blood when one of his Illweather pursuers rode by, decapitating his aggressor.
Hunter crouched, shielding his head with his hands. What was going on here? Afraid to stand and come within mounted sickle range, he crawled forward on hands and knees to retrieve his sword, looking around and trying to determine what all this meant.
The new elves, the bush elves, were outnumbered and unmounted, but they had caught some eight or nine Illweathers i
n their nets and were more than holding their own. They were taking advantage of the afternoon sun to dismount and dismember every rider they could find. The trapped elves made even more noise than the ones engaged in battle: they whooped, jeered and shouted advice at their fellows, who seemed to ignore them completely. As far as Hunter could see, none of the islanders had yet been captured in the sky-nets. Perhaps these new elves expected to deal with the humans after the battle was over.
Hunter crawled a little farther forward, still squinting at the scene behind him. To his relief, all of his friends seemed to be alive so far. The horses had not fared as well. One of the ones that pulled the chariot was already dead, with the other uncomprehendingly attempting to drag both corpse and chariot all by itself. Criton’s horse too had been slaughtered, but Criton had been able to fly up into a tree before his attacker could catch him. Narky was still riding an uninjured mount, but to Hunter’s surprise, he soon wheeled it around to help Phaedra. Maybe Hunter’s words had had an influence on him after all.
“Run!” Narky yelled at the children, dismounting beside the chariot. “Run! Get out of here! Make for the Gateway!”
They did as he said, running away on their little legs while Narky helped Phaedra onto his horse. “Go,” Hunter heard him say. “The rest of us will meet you there. At least, I sure as hell hope we do.”
Hunter did not know how many bush elves had started this fight, but now there were only six. The Illweathers were faring little better, however. All but five of them were either captured or dead, though as Hunter watched, one of them rode down and butchered a bush elf to even the score. But Hunter’s eyes were on the two captains.
The Illweather captain’s horse was among the fallen, and she was facing off with her counterpart, their blades flashing. They moved almost too quickly for Hunter to understand, slashing and blocking and parrying and evading. Hunter realized suddenly how lucky he was that the only elf he had had to fight on his own had been a groom. These two were so fast that their movements were a blur.
Then in an instant it was over. The captain of the bush elves made a beautiful cut at the Illweather captain, but instead of parrying the blade, she parried his arm. The bush captain’s arm flew off his body, and a second later, so did his grinning head.
“A rare win, captain,” laughed the head, as it rolled back toward the islanders. “Next time, the pleasure will be mine.”
Hunter jumped to his feet and ran. There was nothing he could hope to accomplish in a fight against speed like theirs. Narky had come to the same conclusion, and was already a few paces ahead of him. Criton flew above, doing his best to stay out of reach. They fled as fast as they could, hoping that the remaining ambushers would buy them just a few minutes before the Illweathers could give chase. Hunter ran, and did not stop for breath.
It did not take long to catch up with the children, small as they were. Hunter snatched up little Breaker as he ran, speeding through the undergrowth with the boy slung over his shoulder. Then, finally, the ruins of Gateway came into sight.
The stones were shrouded in a thick mist, spinning and swirling just as they had done a week and a half earlier when the islanders had fallen through into this world. It was a welcome sight, this time around.
“Bandu!” cried Criton, coming down for a landing. “Bandu, are you still here?”
“I am here!” her voice answered, from somewhere within the mists. “But they catch me in a net now. Where the Goodweathers are?”
“Still fighting the Illweathers,” said Narky. “Is the gate open?”
“Yes,” Bandu wailed, still concealed by the mist. “Take net and open gate is all same thing. But I am in net still here! I can’t go out to you!”
“Wait for me,” yelled Criton. “I’ll find you and get you out of there!”
Hunter put Breaker down and stretched his weary left arm. “She can’t do anything but wait,” he heard Narky mutter.
Criton vanished into the fog just as Phaedra rode out of it, soaking wet. “The gate is open!” she shouted. “I’ve just been to the other side! It’s open! Follow me!”
Hunter looked back and gulped. The other children were still running toward him, with three mounted elves already in pursuit. The Illweather captain rode in the middle, with a male elf on one side and the ethereal Raider Eleven on the other. Their sickles were dripping blood.
“There!” cried Criton triumphantly, shrouded in mist and apparently unaware of the situation, “Now stand up, and – what’s all this you’re – oh no, we don’t have time to worry about…”
“Follow Phaedra!” Hunter shouted at the children. “Narky, you too. I’ll go last…”
Tella had fallen. The poor girl had simply tripped over her own feet as she ran, tumbling to the ground and skinning her knee. Her tumble was so perfectly childlike that in any other context it might have been endearing. Instead, it spelled disaster.
“Go!” Hunter repeated, running toward the fallen girl. “Everybody, go!”
He reached Tella as she was rising unsteadily to her feet, tears in her eyes. “I’ve got you,” he said, sheathing his sword and lifting her off the ground. Then he sprinted back toward the mist, cursing silently to himself. The elf captain was so close behind them now that he doubted he would make it. In fact, he was sure he wouldn’t. What would they do to him? The riddle game probably meant nothing as a protection against their blades, but if it did, he was sure to find out soon enough.
The thundering hooves were shaking the ground beneath him, but he dared not turn his head. He poured his last, desperate energies into his sprint, even while his legs began to feel as if they were made of wood.
A net flew out of the mist ahead, hissing through the air. Hunter ducked as he ran, and it passed overhead. He heard the captain’s cry from behind him, screaming out a furious curse while Hunter’s numbing legs carried him out of the clear air and into the fog. On and on he ran with Tella clutched in his arms, until he could hear the others’ calls once more and felt the sweet rain on his face.
46
Criton
Criton had only just pulled the sky-net off Bandu and taken Hunter’s armor from her hands when the girl lurched to her feet, snatched the net away from him and threw it with all her might. “Now we go,” she said.
When they stumbled out of the mists, it was raining heavily. The wet forest and mossy stones welcomed them with a benevolent inertness – one that he had always taken for granted before. All around him, other bodies were crashing through the bushes, falling and springing up again – running for their lives.
“Find cover,” Hunter shouted. “They’re still coming!”
Criton and Bandu staggered forward together, collapsing at last behind a huge mossy cornerstone. Hopefully the fairies would not find them here. He wished he had a horse for them to ride away on – surely even a regular horse could outrun an exhausted elven one. He wondered what had happened to the horses they had left here.
The sun was just setting dull and gray behind the rainclouds when the captain and Raider Eleven rode out of the mists, holding their nets at their sides.
“Hurry,” said the captain. “We don’t have long before the sun here sets and the barrier closes again. Hurry! The prince will be furious if our quarry escapes.”
Raider Eleven nodded, her newly pale skin shining as if with the light of the unrisen moon. She whistled once, a low whistle that made Criton feel queasy.
“Come out, little ones,” she sang, her voice high and intoxicating. “Follow my voice, little things.”
They would not be able to resist her call for long, Criton knew. He could barely resist it, and the call wasn’t even directed at him. The children would come to her, and they would be eaten.
Suddenly, Narky came into view, leaping onto a rock with his hands outstretched before him. “I am a child strangler!” he shrieked, his voice cracking. His burnt out eye socket gaped menacingly in the semi-darkness while his good eye darted wildly about.
; “Come out like the elf says,” he cried, “and let me get my hands around your little necks!”
The elves hissed furiously at Narky. He gave them a sarcastic salute. He certainly looked like a madman, but would the children be frightened enough to stay in hiding? They had been imprisoned with him for over a week, after all, and he hadn’t strangled any of them.
For now, no children emerged. Of course! The memory-boxes! Narky had figured that the children wouldn’t remember him at all, and that they would find his figure frightening. And so far, at least, he was right.
Raider Eleven made a frustrated sound and tucked her net under her left arm. She reached for the sickle that was slung over her back, but the captain stopped her.
“There’s no time,” she hissed. “Lure the children. I’ll deal with him.”
With an impossibly smooth motion, the captain retrieved her own sickle and spurred her horse toward Narky, who jumped down from his rock and tried to run away. Raider Eleven resumed her call for the children, but this time Hunter jumped up.
“I cut children to pieces!” he shouted, standing on the other side of the tower’s foundation. “Come out here and I’ll skewer you!”
With a grunt, the elven captain veered off and charged now at Hunter, allowing Narky to escape into the woods. Hunter also turned to run as the captain bore down on him, and once again Raider Eleven took up her song.
“Come to me, children!” she trilled, her voice sweet and ethereal.
With a silent prayer to God Most High, Criton shot into the air. “I come from the seed of dragons!” he shouted, breathing fire in all directions and turning the nearby raindrops to steam. “Come near me, and I’ll burn you!”
With a look of disgust, the fairy captain turned away from chasing Hunter and cast her net into the air. Criton had no chance to avoid it, but in the end he didn’t have to. The twinkling sky-net faded as it neared him, disappearing into the growing darkness. Both elves cried out in anguish. Their time was up. They turned their horses and galloped back through the misty gate. Within moments, they were gone.