Once upon a Summer Day fs-1

by Dennis McKiernan

  And even as Borel staggered upright and the Sprite cried out, “My lord, you are safe,” the tumbling, whirling juggernaut of a grapnel hurled on, snapping the rope taut to violently jerk Borel from his feet and wrench him plowing down through scree the remainder of the slope ere both hook and prince came to a stop.

  With the Sprite anxiously hovering nearby and the bee orbiting ’round, Borel lay for long moments, trying to collect his thoroughly addled wits and wondering if ought was broken.

  “My lord, are you dead?” asked the Sprite.

  “Ungh,” replied Borel, cautiously moving, feeling of his limbs and fingers and ribs, grimacing now and then as he probed.

  “Oh, good, you are fine,” said the Sprite, settling on a nearby rock, the bee alighting as well. “For an instant I thought you killed.”

  “I feel as if I have been slain,” replied Borel, bloody and bruised and wincing as he removed the three-cornered hat, which incredibly had somehow managed to stay on, and he touched a great knot even then swelling on the back of his head.

  “My lord, we must away,” said the Sprite. “The Trolls are like to pursue.”

  Borel eased the tricorn back on his head and, groaning, slowly got to his feet. Moving with care, he untangled the rope from ’round his torso. “See you the rucksack I tossed over the sill?”

  “I will look,” said the Sprite, taking to wing, “though we must away soon.” Off he darted, the bee following.

  Borel examined his bow, finding it fit-neither horn nor ironwood nor silken string were any worse for the wear-though most of his arrows were broken or missing; only three survived intact, yet he retained all six of the ruined ones for their heads and fletching. His long-knife as well had come through unscathed, though the scabbard was now freshly scarred. As for Borel himself, he was thoroughly battered, and blood seeped from a handful of scrapes, but his leathers had protected him from the worst of his tumble among the rocks, and, but for one knot, the cocked hat had saved his head. Even so, amid all the other hurts, he knew he would have a great long bruise running from his crotch up across his chest and over his shoulder and down his back where the entangled line had been jerked taut by the runaway grapnel.

  Borel made his way down the last few feet of the slope, dragging the rope after. And then coiling it as he went, he made his way to the hook, where he untied the last of the line. A few yards ahead lay reeds, growing in the muddy shallows of the river, its far bank perhaps a quarter mile away.

  The Sprite came flying back. “I did not find your rucksack, my lord; I’m afraid it’s buried under the slide, though there is a rock-laden cloth of some sort lying nigh.”

  “Where?”

  “I’ll show you, my lord.”

  Following the Sprite, Borel painfully made his way up the slope of rubble, where he found the cloak he had packed in the rucksack, but no sign of ought else. He unslung his bow and quiver and took up the garment and slipped it on, and found a brooch hidden in the collar to fasten it with. The Sprite flying well above called out, “Boats, my lord. I see some boats. Perhaps you can use one to escape the oncoming Trolls.”

  “Whence the Trolls?” asked Borel.

  The Sprite pointed, and Borel saw two Trolls tramping along a sloping way wending across the nearly plumb face of the cliff, a handful of Goblins trailing.

  “No doubt they want their meal,” growled Borel, slinging his bow and the quiver. “Which way the boats?”

  “Yonder, my lord,” said the Sprite, again pointing.

  Borel groaned. “Toward the place where the Trolls are heading.”

  “Yes, my lord,” said the Sprite.

  “Then let us go,” said Borel, and he haltingly made his way to the bottom of the scree and took up the coil of line and began hobbling in the direction indicated, following the flow of the river.

  And the Trolls continued on downward.

  And the Sprite and the bumblebee flew ahead of the prince and headed for the cache of boats.

  In the distance the Goblins began yelling and pointing. They had spotted Borel making his way downstream along the riverbank.

  The Trolls hastened…

  “Hurry, my lord,” urged the Sprite.

  Grunting against the pain, Borel limped faster.

  “This way,” said the Sprite, his bee buzzing ahead.

  More swiftly went the Trolls, and more swiftly went Borel.

  Now prince and bee and Sprite came to a bend in the river, and the reeds grew thickly there.

  “Into the water, my lord; all are hidden within.”

  Borel splashed in among the reeds, and he came to a half-sunken boat, its bottom stove in.

  Another boat and another he found, all broken.

  “Is this as they all are?” he asked.

  “Oh, my lord, I am sorry,” said the Sprite, darting from craft to craft, “but they all seem smashed.”

  “Is there nought afloat?”

  The Sprite flew higher, even as Borel could hear shouts and thudding footsteps nearing.

  “A raft, my lord, here is a raft!” cried the Sprite, flying back to lead the way. “Oh, hurry, please hurry.”

  Now flitting down among the reeds so as not to be seen, the Sprite led Borel to a large log float with steering sweeps fore and aft and rafting poles adeck, a reed-free channel to the river lying ahead. Throwing his coil of recovered rope onto the raft and untying the float’s mooring line from a post deeply driven into the bottom, Borel pushed. The craft did not move, for it was mired in the mud.

  “Oh, hurry, my lord, they draw near.”

  Straining, gritting his teeth, and heaving to the limit of his strength, Borel managed to break the float free of its mud-bottom anchorage, and even as he heard Trolls splashing into the water among the reeds, searching, and Redcaps ashore calling to one another, he shoved the raft out and away, pushing it along the channel. At last he won past the reeds and into the slow-moving current, and he clambered up over the end and grabbed a pole and thrust toward midstream.

  “There he is,” shrilled a voice, and Borel turned to see a Goblin on the high bank and pointing.

  And as the ten-foot-tall Trolls bellowed and splashed through the reeds in pursuit, Borel poled with all his might, the long, heavy shaft finding purchase against the bottom. Thrust, lift, set, thrust, lift, set, thrust… time and again, and all the while the Sprite screamed, “Oh, faster, my lord, faster, faster! Oh, my lord, my lord.”

  The Trolls broke free of the reeds, and Goblins ashore shouted in glee and sprinted downstream.

  And then the float reached swifter water, and yet the howling Trolls came on, now but a handful of yards away.

  And still the Sprite shrieked in fear for Borel.

  Realizing that unless the river got deeper, the Trolls would reach the raft, Borel dropped the pole adeck and strung his bow. And even as he nocked an arrow, one Troll grabbed the aft sweep.

  Ssssthock! The shaft pierced the Troll through the eye.

  The monstrous being screamed and pitched over backwards, slain, water closing over his massive body. The following Troll, waist-deep, roared in fury and pressed faster through the flow.

  Borel nocked another arrow and drew the shaft to the full. Once more he loosed- Ssssthock! — and took the Troll in the throat.

  Gggh! Choking, grabbing his gullet, the Troll fell sideways with a splash, to rise up and fall again and disappear into the current.

  Borel nocked his last good arrow and aimed toward the Redcaps ashore pacing the raft, and they screamed in terror and turned and fled.

  Exhausted, Borel slipped the arrow back into his quiver and slumped down on the logs.

  “I thought you were a goner for certain,” said the Sprite, landing adeck, tears streaming down his face.

  “So did I, tiny one,” said Borel, removing his quiver and setting it aside, then dragging the coil of rope over to use as a pillow. He reclined on his back and looked up at the high blue sky and sighed and said, “So did I.”

&nbs
p; The bumblebee landed as well, alighting on Borel’s chest. Controlling his urge to slap, the prince looked at the wee dark insect and began to laugh as the flowing river bore them away downstream.

  11

  River

  Of a sudden, “The moon!” cried Borel, and he lurched upright to a sitting position, upsetting the bee, who took to wing and buzzed away to land on the handle end of the fore steering sweep. “Where stands the moon?”

  “My lord?”

  “What is the phase of the moon?”

  The Sprite frowned then said, “Tonight it will be two days past full, Sieur.”

  “Ah, good,” said Borel, painfully groaning as he lay back down. “Then I haven’t lost a great deal of time.”

  The Sprite flitted to land on Borel’s chest, there where the bee had once been. He plopped down and, elbows on knees and his face in his hands, he sat looking at the prince.

  Borel smiled and said, “Have you a name, tiny one?”

  “Yes, my lord. ’Tis Flic.” The Sprite stood and sketched a bow and then resumed his seat and said, “And you, Sieur?”

  “I am Prince Borel of-”

  “Of the Winterwood?”

  “Yes, Flic. It is my demesne.”

  “Oh, I’ve always wanted to see the Winterwood, but Buzzer would go dormant in the cold, and so might I.”

  “Buzzer?”

  “My companion,” replied Flic, pointing at the bee yet perched on the fore sweep.

  “How came you to be in that cage, Flic?”

  “The Goblins captured me in a fine net and took me prisoner.”

  “To what end?”

  “I am a Sprite of the fields, and the Trolls tried to force me into having my friends-the bees-make honey, every last drop of which the Trolls would take to baste their fare. I refused, of course, for I cannot think of a more heinous crime than making slaves of bees. Regardless, the Trolls said that when I got hungry enough, then I would obey. They tried to starve me into submission, but they hadn’t counted on Buzzer feeding me. I thought, though, that I would never get free, be a prisoner forever, yet you came along and, well…”

  They drifted downriver in silence for a while, the unguided raft slowly turning in the current, and then Flic said, “And you, Prince Borel, how came you to my rescue?”

  “I was escaping, Flic, for I was to be one of those whom they would baste with honey.”

  A horrified look came over the Sprite’s face. “You mean they were going to eat you?”

  Borel nodded. “Spitted, roasted, and consumed.”

  “Oh, my, that might be a crime even worse than making slaves of bees.”

  Borel grinned. “Perhaps.”

  “Is that their customary fare? — Trolls and Goblins eating people, I mean.”

  Borel nodded. “Whenever they can come by such, I ween.”

  “Oh, my. Well, then I am glad that I didn’t have the bees give them honey.”

  A frown came over Borel’s face, and he glanced back in the direction of the cliff. “Hmm… By the number of shackles in the prison where I was held and the count of the craft they’ve hidden in the reeds, I deem they waylay river travellers.”

  “Oh,” said Flic. “That’s why all the boats were…” His voice trailed off, but Borel knew what he meant.

  “Someday,” said Borel, “after I complete the task I am on, I’ll have to take a warband to that place and clean out the nest of its vipers.”

  Again they drifted along without speaking, but then Flic said, “Yet tell me, Prince, how came you to be in their clutches in the first place, and what is this task you are on, and what does the moon have to do with ought?”

  “ ’Tis quite a tale, Flic, not long in the telling, and it seems we do have time. You see, I’ve been having these dreams, and there is a witch named Hradian…”

  “And so you always see this lady, this Demoiselle Chelle, in a stone chamber?” asked Flic.

  “Yes. That is the way of it. We seem to be linked, and always I find myself there, and likewise she seems to know something of where I am, else she wouldn’t have warned me of the oncoming Goblins.”

  Flic stroked his chin. “Next time you find yourself in that chamber, why don’t you take her somewhere else? Somewhere out of that chamber. Perhaps down those steps you spoke of.”

  “Dreams are strange, Flic. It’s not as if I can control them.”

  “Ah, but you can, Lord Borel, to some extent, that is.”

  “How so?”

  “A seer once told me that if in the midst of a dream I somehow discovered I was dreaming, then I could change the dream to an extent.”

  “Hmm…” mused Borel. “And you think I can in some way use this knowledge?”

  “Indeed, Prince Borel, for can you guide your dream, perhaps you can turn the conversation in a way that will aid you in your task.”

  “Maybe so,” said Borel. “Yet tell me this: just how would I go about discovering I am dreaming?”

  “Ah, there is the rub,” said Flic. “What is required is some sort of trip or trigger or stratagem that will let the dreamer know he is dreaming. In your case, I suggest you fix on something extraordinary about the setting-say, the band across her eyes, or better yet those strange, floating daggers-so that when you see them you can then become aware that you are in a dream and take steps to guide the dream into channels other than the one you find yourself in.”

  “And how do I do that, Flic?”

  “I’ll tell you what I was told: when you settle down to sleep, try to fix the triggering sight-say, the daggers-in your mind, and the thought that when you see them you will know you are dreaming. If successful, you can then change the dream.”

  “Have you ever done this, Flic? — Guided your own dreams?”

  “Well, no. But you see, I’ve never had a need, never found myself in a dream as important as yours. I mean, after all, perhaps by guiding your dream and speaking with the demoiselle, she can aid you in setting her free.”

  Borel sighed and said, “I cannot promise I will succeed, nevertheless I will try. Yet it seems to me that I have a larger problem than guiding my dreams. You see, although I have been to Lord Roulan’s estate, at the moment I do not know where we are, hence I know not where his lands lie from here, and yet I must get to them ere the full moon comes again.”

  Flic frowned and said, “What are his gardens like?”

  “What?”

  “Lord Roulan: what kind of flowers does he grow?”

  Though he was lying down, Borel managed a shrug. “I don’t know. Besides, what has that to do with ought?”

  “I believe we can take you there,” said Flic, glancing at Buzzer.

  Surprised, Borel sat up, nearly dumping Flic. But the Sprite took to flight and settled atop the stanchion of the aft steering sweep. Holding out a hand of apology, Borel said, “Know you where Roulan’s estate lies?”

  “Nay, my lord, I do not, but mayhap Buzzer does.”

  Borel frowned. “Your bee knows of Roulan?”

  “Nay, Prince, but mayhap she knows of Roulan’s gardens.”

  “His gardens?”

  “Aye. You see, unlike most bees, Buzzer is not deterred by twilight borders, and she wandered into Faery from the mortal world quite long apast, and she has been here ever since. She has plundered more blooms than anyone can count, and when it comes to flowers, she remembers where blossoming fields and beds lie. And so, all I need from you is a description of Roulan’s gardens, and if Buzzer has been there, well… So again I ask, what kinds of flowers does Lord Roulan grow?”

  Borel turned up his hands. “It has been long since I was there. Besides, I do not know much of flowers, for I am of the Winterwood, where flowers are all but nonexistent.”

  “Regardless, Prince, this is important if we are to aid you. So try to remember.”

  Borel closed his eyes, attempting to visualize Roulan’s estate. “I don’t… um-Oh, wait, I do remember a strange little flower. Clumps of green leaves, thr
ee to a stem straight from the ground, and several tiny blossoms on separate stems.”

  “Clover, my lord?”

  “I don’t think so.” Borel held out a hand and spread his fingers wide. “Unlike the nubs of clover heads, I seem to recall that the flowers had petals straight out that went all the way ’round.”

  “How many petals?”

  His eyes yet closed, Borel said, “Five, six, seven-Ah, I do not remember.”

  “What color?”

  Borel sighed and shook his head. “Yellow, I think-No, wait, pink. Chelle-she was but a child at the time-plucked a blossom and held it up saying, ‘Pink as my lips.’ ”

  “Pink as your lips?”

  “No. Pink as hers.”

  “Ah, then. Three leaves on a stem, growing in clumps, tiny pink blossoms, most likely with five petals if I have guessed right: shamrock, I think. Not exactly rare in Faery, yet not common either. Even so, shamrock alone is not enough to go on.”

  Borel opened his eyes. “I recall something else, Flic. Chelle also had a flower in her hair, a rose, I believe, white with a pale pink tinge.”

  “Good. Pink-flowering shamrock and white roses with a faint blush. What other blossoms were about?”

  “I don’t recall any others.”

  “None at all?”

  Dejected, Borel shook his head.

  “Do not despair, Lord Borel, for there are yet ways to explore.”

  Borel looked up. “Such as…?”

  “What fruit did you eat while there?”

  “None I recall. Oh, we did have a blackberry torte, but I think that’s not exactly-”

  “Fresh blackberries, or preserves?” Flic interjected.

  Borel closed his eyes and frowned, then said, “Was it fresh-picked that day? Yes. I remember now. We spent part of the morning plucking them from a rather large patch of briars. Chelle’s mouth was stained purple, for she ate one of every two she gathered.”

  “You seem to recall much of Demoiselle Chelle, Lord Borel,” said Flic, grinning.