Greyfax Grimwald

by Niel Hancock

  Cephus Starkeeper breathed out a long sigh, and tugged his beard slowly.

  “Ah, and so it is that we have the very problem we have been warned of, and the very task before us that we suspected would come to pass.”

  Greyfax nodded, his back to the older man.

  He felt suddenly weary, and for a brief moment, discouraged.

  Cephus went to Greyfax and put an arm about his shoulder.

  “This means, then, exactly what the Book spoke of. The omen that would signal the last recall of this cycle. It’s almost upon us, then, if Dorini has begun her bid to overthrow his natural plan of things.”

  “And the other omens have all come,” said Greyfax softly, “one by one. I hardly noticed at first. There was the failing of the Order of the Circle, when Eiorn refused to give the Secret he held back, and passed it on to his son Tyron instead.

  “In the first War of the Dragon, it was decided that the Five Secrets should be distributed to certain elders of the Circle for safekeeping. Eiorn was assigned the task of guarding one of the Secrets, and promptly took it where he thought it would be best kept, which was to his old wood across Calix Stay.

  “As time wore on, Eiorn became more and more taken with the beautiful thing he kept, and in the end, he began devising schemes that would enable him to keep it for himself, rather than return it to its rightful place.

  “It was in this way that he disclaimed the decision of the Circle to return the Secrets, and said that as long as Lorini was not returned to the Fields of Light, they would never be rid of her dark sister, and as long as she remained free, he could not give over the Secret in his keeping and thereby place it in such grave danger.

  “Eiorn, of course, knew that no one would suggest sending Lorini away, and therefore, in his own mind, he had created the perfect reason for keeping the Secret to himself, and at his own passing for turning it over to his son Tyron.

  “That Eiorn, a highly respected and honorable member of the elders of the Circle, should fall prey to the great temptation of using the powers of the Secret speaks dearly the dangers of the forces at work in the mighty wonders of the Arkenchest.

  “There is that chaos to deal with yet. Then the appearance of the dwarf from beyond Calix Stay with the Secret which I had given to his father to hold, and who had handed it down to his son. He had it with him still, unknowing. And then all the rest, and now Dorini on the march, attempting to put herself on the footing of our Lord.”

  Cephus Starkeeper chuckled, his clear blue-gray eyes dancing.

  “I must admit, this is exciting, Greyfax. I know it is unheard of to allow oneself to feel this way, but I almost certainly do. And I can’t say I’ll be too sorry to get Home, once this is over.” He shook his head. “How long has it been now? A second? A day? An aeon? Or simply beyond measure?”

  “It has been long, my dear fellow. I feel it more where I carry on my tasks, for there is where we feel such a thing as marked time.”

  “And I am sure it is growing tiresome for you?” Cephus smiled gently at his friend before going on. “I know. I spent my time upon a sphere such as that long before you attained the Circle. I know the agony it is.”

  “Yet I can’t complain at all, for it is as it should be,” Greyfax hastily corrected. “It’s just that I miss talking to you, or Erophin, or any other friends of the Fellowship. It is very lonely, at times, knowing what is to be, and unable to tell anyone.”

  “All, as you say, to the purpose. It is the way we progress, old fellow. And what of your aide? Faragon is one of the Fairingays, and I should think he would be most suitable for the mission.”

  “Oh, the lad is more than one could ask for, but you know what it is working with these impetuous young pups. They’ve not gotten over their somewhat overpowering passions yet. And even the passions of a good nature can complicate one’s effectiveness, you know. But he’s a good lad, and we get on famously, although he does get miffed at me now and again.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. I’ve always thought a lot of Faragon, and his father and brothers, too, for that matter.” Cephus paused and glanced at his friend. “Come, we must take some refreshment now. We shall have our chat, then meet with Erophin. He will be with us presently.”

  “I know this is all highly unusual, but I needed to hear your thoughts and get Erophin to express his views,” said Greyfax, sitting down to a long, low table, spread with a faintly glowing silver cloth that shimmered with a fine golden mist deep within its depths.

  “Not unusual at all, old fellow,” chuckled Cephus, clapping Greyfax heartily on the back, then taking his own seat. “We had been expecting you long before now.”

  “You mean you’ve known of Dorini’s plan, and all the rest?”

  “Oh, ages since. The Book has it all there. It was foretold. But the Circle has met since last you came to us, and all that is known to all now. So perhaps we can be of some help to you on this visit, and fill you in on the things you will need to know.”

  Greyfax sat back in his chair, shaking his head slowly in amusement.

  “I should have guessed this visit of mine wasn’t chance happening. Nothing ever really is. But let’s see to our supper now. I am anxious to hear the news, and to find out what suggestions I may take back with me to help me carry out my errand successfully.”

  And so the two began talking low and earnestly, eating from the long table, and laughing in places, or chuckling, or frowning, or pacing up and down the long, comfortable high-raftered room.

  This took place in the early afternoon of that realm, and it was a stroke past teatime before Erophin arrived.

  Tea

  With Otter

  Otter, at the moment, was pouring out a cup of blueberry tea for Bear, bustling about his shelf trying to find honey, and exclaiming loudly, “Oh, drat and confound it, I never seem to be able to find anything at all here when I want it, or even when I don’t want it, for that matter,” He slammed another cabinet shut and scampered angrily to a small sideboard next to the fireplace, his gray muzzle whiskers twitching rapidly and his little paws darting here and about in the jumble of stuff and junk on the shelves. Bear had gotten up and was cautiously poking about, for the room was really only meant for animals or elves or dwarfs who measured no taller than three or four feet high, and although Otter considered his kitchen ceiling very high and roomy compared to some holts he had lived in, it forced Bear to walk about on all fours, and even then there would be a grunt or gruff, snort or shuffle, and he would have banged his nose or stubbed a paw. Now the great brown head was lost almost up to the ears in a cupboard, and his rumbling voice sounded far away to Otter, who had to keep saying, “Whater, whater,” anytime Bear spoke.

  “I said, are you sure you had honey?”

  “Oh, bumblebee hickiby, yes, I have honey. It’s around here somewhere, and now the tea is cold and nothing ever goes right in this holt. That’s the third cup of blueberry tea I’ve had cold today, and I still can’t find honey.”

  And Bear, who had moved into a still lower shelf, his great, fiat brown haunches pointing almost up to the roof, wiggled his brown and white tail in sympathy, but still sorely disappointed at not having his afternoon honey without looking all over Otter’s kitchen for it, and bumping his nose or stubbing his paw every so often.

  “Well, it’s good to be back anyhow. I’ve had enough of wandering around beyond our valley,” grumped Bear, raising his head in a sudden caught breath. He bumped his nose badly. “Honey,” he whispered under his breath. Down lower, until he was fiat on Otter’s earthen floor, reaching a great paw back and back to the inner depths of Otter’s not so neatly arranged staples. He trapped his paw, and backing out too rapidly, put his tail straight into the open fire.

  “Eeek, dear me, ohhhh,” and moving much too quickly for Otter’s small quarters, he bumped his nose hard on a roof beam, and while grabbing for the new hurt, he tipped over the pot of water boiling on the hearth. “Aiiii,” moaned Bear, crashing headlong onward.<
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  “Watch out, Bear,” cried Otter, too late, and sensing the end, dived headlong under the table to avoid being burned or crushed, and Bear, one paw to his nose and one to his bottom, danced on one back paw that was in the pool of hot water, and crashed and tore his way outride, knocking Otter’s small green door off one hinge in the process.

  Bear fell down under a pine tree, holding his nose and rump and trying to cover his burned paw with his other, but he at last gave up with a long sigh and wail, and finally amply sat heavily in the soft blanket of snow, moaning from time to time.

  Otter, peering out from under his table, rose cautiously and went slowly to his damaged door, looking at his wrecked kitchen, starting to chastise Bear for his clumsiness, but seeing his friend hurt, he darted to the big animal, angry and sorry that he had let himself get upset at the accident to his kitchen.

  “Dumb honey, anyhow. If we hadn’t been looking for that, this never would have happened. Here, Bear, come on, maybe we’ll have our tea straight.”

  “Grumph,” growled Bear. “Thanks, but I’ll just sit here a bit.”

  “We’ll have it all put back as nicely as before, Bear, don’t worry. That door had a terrible squeak in it anyhow, and I think that top hinge was the one. I’ve been meaning to do something about it for weeks, even before we went on our little scouting party, but I just never seemed to get around to it; Otter sat down in the snow beside his friend. “It’s much nicer out here now to begin with. I don’t know why we don’t bring the table out under the trees and have our tea here, and watch the sky awhile.”

  So the two friends brought out the table and tea and sat outside, watching the mountains grow dark as the sun began slowly to lower its light into night.

  “My, but sunsets are very nice. I don’t see why Dwarf never enjoys things anymore. He’s so glum lately, especially after we told him we’d really found nothing at all.” Otter paused, then went on in a different tone. “I don’t remember ever being anywhere there was no sunset. Do you, Bear?”

  “I can’t really say. I think maybe when I lived for a time in the far north, we had days and days of light. It was strange, but then I’ve seen stranger, and I don’t remember a lot of things that have happened to me.”

  The great creature tugged his whiskers, his eyes growing darker, and he left Otter for a while, thinking. “But now I think I remember something, but I can’t recall exactly what. It was finding nothing at all that seemed to be the most scary thing.”

  Otter ignored his friend’s reply.

  “Do you think I might just have let it slip my mind, Bear?”

  The big animal looked startled.

  “Let what slip your mind?”

  “That jar of honey.”

  Bear moaned softly, stroked his muzzle, and drank what was left of his bitter tea.

  The sun was gone completely now, leaving the animals in the sort twilight, and a cool breeze sprang out of the dim forest, crisp with pine smells, and snowy fir and gorse, and the sweet smell of powdery snow on berry bushes. Otter’s ears flattened back and his little body began to shiver, nose up, searching the evening winds, small brown eyes all black now, and wide. He began whistling low in his throat as if in danger, and his forepaws moved quickly to cover his face from whatever he saw or heard or smelled. Bear, seeing his friend, suddenly rose up to his full height, hackles bristling, great paws opened and showing long, sharp claws, huge, powerful mouth drawn back in a menacing, terrifying snarl. He let go one long, rumbling growl that stopped the wind for a moment, and the trees in the forest cowered, and even the distant mountains halted for a breath and echoed back that raw, stark, horrible warning. Then the wind resumed, and everything was as before, and Bear looked around to his small gray friend, who had crept between his back legs, whimpering and whistling, for he had never heard his friend raise his mighty voice before in such a strange, yet familiar rumble.

  Bear carefully stepped away and lowered himself to all fours.

  “What was it, Otter? What frightened you so?” His hackles began a tentative lowering, and he reached out one huge paw and patted the otter gently on his soft gray back.

  “It wasn’t anything here, Bear. Just when you were asking me if I remembered anything from before, I did, and I saw what it was for a moment, but it was all dark and I couldn’t see it, but I knew “it was there. And when I remembered it from before, it was here, too, and then when we didn’t find anything on our little trip up the valley, and you said that was what scared you most, it seemed to scare me. It had something to do with the light, but I don’t remember what. But I’m frightened now, Bear.”

  “There, there, old man. There’s nothing here now, or at least there shouldn’t be,” and just to make sure, Bear raised himself to an even greater height, his massive head thrown back, his chest expanded until Otter could no longer see the sky above him. He then let forth such a bellow of rage and danger that the wind quit altogether and turned inside out, rustling the treetops like a cyclone and filling the canyons with a harsh, rasping shriek, and the mountains increased the rumble growl until it shook the distant seas, and the awakening stars hid their eyes for a few moments, leaving the silence that followed as still and dark as a musty, creaking dream of what no sound is like, but is when it throws off its cloak and takes the dreamer into its arms in the deepest stillness of all.

  Bear’s great ears were laid back, his teeth flashed like dancing white steel fire in the darkness, and he raised his forepaws forward again, showing the dagger-sharp claws that out of old animal habit he always kept trim and properly honed until he could rake the bark off even stout oaks or ironwood trees with a simple swipe. Then there was the moon, and the stars one by one came out again, and the wind caught its breath and resumed its gentle snoring, and brought with it the smell of the sleeping, snow-blanketed forest again, and whatever it had been that was there was gone from Otter’s heart, and only a trace of his fear remained. The two friends did not speak for a while longer, for it was only polite not to speak of it, unless absolutely necessary, and even at that one must always be very careful. Finally Otter’s gray ears twitched and popped up from fiat back, and he shuffled his forepaws a few times in the snow, sniffed, stuck out his tongue, raised up on his hind paws, looked all about him, chuckled low in his throat, coughed and said, “Do you think this has anything at all to do with what Dwarf has been so worried about? Or with anything that he might have been sending us out to look for?”

  Bear looked down at his little companion for a long while. “Perhaps so. Somehow I feel it does, but then you know Dwarf, always full of mysterious goings-on, and you never can get him shushed up once you get him onto his gloomy tales and lore books.” He stopped to trail his paw across his sore backside awhile. “Except I do remember an awful lot of goings-on from my time, like this, and others, and I think it must all be part of whatever it is Dwarf speaks of. There seems to be a lot more in our crossing Calix Stay than finding a new home in this valley.

  “Oh, let’s put the door back up. Bear. I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep unless my door is locked tonight.”

  Otter looked despairingly at his door, broken and hanging by one small steel finger. And starting to move off, Otter stopped again. “I think we must talk to Dwarf tomorrow, and see what is to be done, or make some sort of plan. Something from a long time ago has come back to me, and I’m sure we must have seen it, or rather felt it tonight.”

  “Or not seen it,” finished Bear, shooting a meaningful glance at his friend. “It’s always the things you can’t put your paw to that are the most frightening”

  After the door was repaired and locked, Bear and Otter talked of going to the river for a late night walk, but the thought of it didn’t appeal to the friends, especially the thought of going about in the darkness that now seemed darker than before. The moon slowly slid into a vast gray-black cloud and disappeared, and after Bear had reluctantly gone home to his lair, Otter latched all the shutters, checked the door twice, banked the
fire, and laid his stout little walking stick beside his hammock for a cudgel, feeling silly at the thought of it, but somehow it made him feel better that it was near.

  While they slept, Otter with his walking stick and Bear with one great dark brown eye open, Dwarf awakened with a scream that he thought was a nightmare.

  Froghorn Fairingay, who had been wandering across the star universes of Windameir, knew better, and leapt up in the dark room to work a spell, cursing himself for becoming so secure and not thinking anything would happen until Greyfax returned, but it was too late.

  The son of Suneater and Fireslayer had come on a ray of ragged silver-edged mooonlight and taken Dwarf away into the land of cold and darkness. Froghorn, spinning around and lamenting to himself in his own tongue, felt somewhat better when he saw the Arkenchest was still safe, but it was a bitter consolation for him, and he ground his teeth in anger and frustration, full of despair that his friend had been taken to a place he knew well, and feared.

  In the cold, empty room, he sat down at last, to plan and think.

  Somehow, he must save Dwarf before Greyfax returned.

  Cakgor

  Cakgor, son of Suneater and Fireslayer, had waited for Dwarf’s house to darken before he moved, and in the half-light of the moon, his savage dark eyes burned in silent hatred of the warm room and all those who dwelled in light. It was only on the darkest nights one could feel his presence, and that icy finger of fear that comes then is the nearness of Cakgor,’ whose domain is terror and blackness. He roamed across the world unnoticed by most, until the evil which lived within him was rampant and spread from every corner where there were living things to infect. His special allies in this world were many, some animals, some men, all who fell under his maligned, cancerous spell. And it had been his passing that had frightened Otter, who knew of him from another time, when he was new in the world and went under another name. Cakgor had heard Bear’s great defiant war cry, and laughed to himself at the thought of how puny and helpless the bear would find himself should Cakgor reveal to him his presence in any one of his terrible forms. Sometimes he chose the wolf, such as his father Suneater, or the body of a burning wind, a cold blue figure that closely resembled a cloud of snow or sleet, but with: a great yawing mouth with long, jagged teeth that shone a vile greenish glow and eyes that were taller than high mountains and phosphorescent in all their dim depths. His dreadful laughter had rung out over the mountains, and took up the sound of tire trees rattling dry leaves, or the grating, harsh sound of sand across parched skin. His business tonight was elsewhere, and he had no time for frivolity, for anyone the Dark Queen should deem important enough to call for must indeed be a powerful enemy. He had crackled silently when he’d seen Dwarf, for surely anyone so small and insignificant could not be so dangerous as the Queen had told him. He stole as silently as a wind into Dwarf s room, froze him immobile with his frigid breath, and hoisted him up in those huge, dripping jaws and was gone, leaving only choking fumes and frozen ice fingers in his wake.