Borel called out through the darkness in the direction the footsteps had fled: “My thanks to Hegwith!”
Jolted awake, Flic sat up and rubbed his eyes and said, “What’s all this shouting about?”
By firelight, Borel examined the ground. “We’ve had visitors in the night, by the look of the tracks perhaps three altogether. They left gifts.”
“Gifts?”
“A jar of honey for you and Buzzer. Some provisions and other needful things for me.”
“No good deed goes unrewarded,” said Flic, yawning. “Or is it instead no good deed goes unpunished?” He glanced at the moon, then lay back down and said to the sky, “It looks as if there is a goodly part of the night left, my prince. Me, I’m going back to sleep. You had better sleep as well; perhaps there is yet time to meet the demoiselle of your dreams.”
“I already did,” said Borel. “We danced.”
“Danced? In the turret?”
“No. In Summerwood Manor. You see, I stepped through a hidden door and into the ballroom.”
Flic did not reply.
Borel looked up to see the Sprite curled against Buzzer in his sleep.
“We had a merry time,” continued Borel, faintly smiling and speaking to himself. “And I called her ‘my love.’ ”
“You what?” said Flic, as he and Buzzer broke fast, lapping at a dribble of honey inside the upturned lid of the jar.
“I called her my love,” replied Borel.
“Well, do you love her?”
“In my dreams I do.”
“Ah, dreams are wild, and anything can happen therein,” said Flic, licking honey from his finger. “I mean, it seems as if there are no restraints on what one will say and do in a dream: give your heart to someone; engage in liaisons; in one moment be here and in the next instant there; conquer your worst enemy; flee from the most insignificant thing; grow to giant size; and other such. Oui, you might confess a desperate love to someone you know-or even a total stranger-when ensnared in a dream, but what matters is how you feel when awake.”
Borel frowned. “I don’t know how I feel. Oh, I think she is quite splendid, but as to love… Flic, she was a child when last I actually saw her, and that is hard for me to dismiss. But in my dreams, she is a lovely demoiselle.”
“Perhaps her dream image is misleading, Borel,” said Flic. “Perhaps it only shows what she would like to be, rather than what she is.”
Borel nodded and stirred the blossoms in the water in the tin pot hanging from the spit above the fire.
Flic said, “Let me see.”
Borel stopped stirring and lifted the pot free and set it before the Sprite, and Flic dipped in a finger and tasted. “It is ready.”
Taking a deep breath, with his gloved hands Borel raised the pot to his lips-“Ow! Too hot!”
“Let it cool a bit,” said Flic, licking more honey from his finger.
Borel stood and took the pot to the stream and set it within, letting chill water cool the metal. In moments he raised it to his lips and drank the full of the yet-warm tisane without pausing. This day it seemed bitter and sweet at one and the same time, and Borel sucked in air between clenched teeth and a tremor ran down his neck and back.
Then he half filled the small container with water, and returned to the fire and set the pot to boil.
He took up his pestle rock and began crushing the last of the moss, turning it to sludge. By the time he and Flic had slathered a thin film of the slime over his faintly discolored bruises, the water in the pot was bubbling. Borel tossed in a fistful of oatmeal, and as he crushed sap from the last of the herbs, he occasionally paused to stir the gruel.
They daubed the herbal juice onto Borel’s nearly healed cuts and scrapes, and then he dressed and broke his fast with oat porridge, using two fingers to scoop it into his mouth.
“Any need to keep the mortars and pestles?” he asked, tilting his head toward the rocks.
“No, Borel, we are finished with the treatments.”
“Good. No use in lugging extra weight.” He took another two fingers of oatmeal and chewed without gusto and swallowed and said, “I am sorely tempted to sweeten this with honey.”
“Feel free, my lord, for Buzzer and I can live long whiles on nectar alone.”
Borel shook his head. “No, tiny one. You and Buzzer need good sustenance. Besides, what I have is nourishing enough, even if it is not tasty.” He scooped another portion into his mouth and barely chewed before swallowing. He glanced at his bow and said, “Perhaps today I will bring down some game.”
As Borel used the Gnome-given rope to belt on the wee rucksack, Buzzer flew about and took a heading, then darted into the twilight border. Borel followed, Flic riding on the prow of the tricorn. They passed into a dimness growing darker and then lighter again, and they emerged into a downpour, a dismal swamp all about.
Nearby, Buzzer clung to the bottom of a limb, and when Borel emerged, the bee flew and alighted on the underside of the tricorn-hat brim.
“She can’t fly in this storm,” said Flic, the Sprite swinging down to land on Borel’s shoulder to take shelter ’neath the brim as well.
Borel turned and strode into the twilight to emerge back in the high mountain vale. “What can we do?”
“Wait for it to stop,” replied Flic.
“Can Buzzer take bearings in the rain?”
“Not in that downpour.”
“Can you ask Buzzer if it’s straight through we need to go?”
“Smooth out a patch of ground,” said Flic.
Moments later, Buzzer was doing her wriggle dance, with Flic paying close attention. Borel smiled, remembering the dance he and Chelle had performed. Finally the Sprite said, “If you can pass straight through the mire to the opposite side and the border beyond, she can take a new sighting. But listen, if you are too far off the line, we might end up someplace altogether different, and she might not be able to find the vale with the pink-petaled shamrock and blushing white roses and thorn-laden blackberry vines… that is, until she comes to a known place, in which case she can fly from there onward.”
Borel nodded, for the twilight borders of Faery are peculiar. A person might cross a given marge at one place and find a pleasant land, whereas crossing that same marge at another point could lead to a dreadful realm. And in some places, one can cross and lop days of travel from the journey, yet just a furlong or so away from that crossing another passage through could add leagues upon leagues to the trek. Hence, one had to be careful of one’s bearings when venturing athwart the twilight walls of Faery, else a planned destination might elude one altogether. Usually, when one found this to be, he crossed back over, moved along the border one way or another-from feet to furlongs to leagues-and then passed through again, hoping to arrive where he wished.
Borel sighed and shook his head. “ ’Tis a mire yon, where one can easily get deflected and off track. I’d rather not gamble. We’ll wait it out.”
And so they waited, impatient Borel repeatedly crossing through the twilight wall, each time discovering the downpour yet raged.
As he waited, he fetched from his quiver the grouse feathers and the thread and the glue provided by his visitors in the night; and he fletched arrows, plume trims replacing the cloth tails. Too, he knapped flint arrowheads, and fitted the rest of the arrowwood shafts. And in between knappings and fittings and fletchings, he crossed over, only to curse at the torrent and then return to the vale.
When night came on, the rain hadn’t stopped, and Buzzer fell dormant in the dark. A short while later, Flic curled up next to the bee.
“Ah, zut! ” said Borel. “There’s nothing for it but that we must wait for morn.”
And so he set his snare in a distant trace and added wood to the fire, and then settled down to sleep.
19
Garden
“Chelle, my love.”
“Yes, Borel.”
“I have in mind another surprise for you.”
A
smile lit Chelle’s face. “A dance?”
“No.”
“If not a dance, what?”
Borel laughed. “If I tell you, it won’t be a surprise.”
“Oh. Hmm. Yes, of course. Then let us be gone, my lord, for I would see this surprise.”
A fleeting grin crossed Borel’s features, only to be replaced by a somber mien. “I must warn you, though, if I do this rightly, then when we step through this door I believe there will be a moon in the sky”-Chelle gasped, but Borel squeezed her hand in reassurance-“and I do not wish you to be alarmed and flee back to here.”
“My lord, the moon, there is less than a moon left.”
“I know, Cherie, and I am on my way. I will be here ere then.”
Chelle stiffened her spine and said, “I will face the dwindling moon with you at my side, my sweet Borel.”
Borel smiled, then turned toward the door and closed his eyes and stood a moment in deep concentration, then opened them again. “I think all is now ready, Chelle,” he said and offered her his arm, and when she took it he led her across the turret floor to the enshadowed door and opened it to find — A moonlit garden, rife with blossoming flowers, white stone pathways wending throughout. Vine-laden arbors graced the grounds, some with deep purple grapes ripe for the plucking, others with grapes of golden-white or rouge-red. Ivy flowed across the soil and up trellises, and a gazebo stood on the bank of a slow-running, crystalline brook.
“Oh, my,” said Chelle, “how splendid. Chrysanthemums, hibiscus, and, oh, spider lilies, red ones and white ones, too. And there is white stonecrop. Oh, the flowers, the flowers, how rich this garden is. Whose is it?”
“It belongs to my sister Liaze. We are in the Autumnwood, her principality.”
“Well, it is a wonderful garden, Borel, and I thank you for bringing me here.”
Borel nodded but said, “I know little of flowers, for my demesne is the Winterwood, where ice and snow rule, though at times, when it thaws a bit, a winter crocus blooms.”
They strolled down the stone pathways, Chelle now and again stopping to inhale the fragrance of a particular blossom.
“I need to know what flowers grow in your own gardens, Chelle,” said the prince.
“Don’t you remember, my lord? I gave you an extensive tour when you visited.”
“Cherie, I think at that time I was more interested in the afternoon hunt your father had planned. As for the tour, well, I merely recall a skinny girl chattering away.”
“Was I, am I that much of a pest?” said Chelle, lifting her face toward his.
“I think you will always distract me,” said Borel, and a long, lingering kiss left both of them breathless. Reluctantly, he released her, and they continued their stroll.
“Chrysanthemums and roses and various wildflowers,” said Chelle.
“What?” said Borel.
“Chrysanthemums and roses and various wildflowers,” said Chelle. “They are what grow in my gardens.”
Borel’s heart sank. “Shamrock? Have you shamrock?”
“Shamrock?”
“I seem to recall you showed me shamrocks. ‘Pink as my lips,’ you said.”
“You remember that?”
“I do.”
“I was trying to get you to notice my lips, my best and perhaps my only feature back then, though my mother seemed to favor my smile, and my sire my eyes.”
“Ah, yes, your eyes,” said Borel. “Would that I could see them.”
“Can you not?”
“No, Chelle. There is a darkness covering them.”
“A darkness?”
Borel nodded.
Chelle frowned. “But I see perfectly well.”
“ ’Tis a mystery, then,” said Borel. “One that we will resolve when I come for you.”
Again Chelle frowned, as if trying to understand what Borel meant. Finally she shrugged and said, “Oh, yes, we do have shamrocks, and they have pink flowers.”
Feeling relieved, Borel said, “White roses with a faint blush?”
“Mm-hm,” said Chelle, as she leaned down to smell the bloom of a crimson mallow.
Now even more confident, the prince asked, “Have you blackberry brambles on your estate?”
“Oh, yes. Don’t you remember we went blackberry harvesting when the hunt was called off?”
“I remember your mouth was stained purple,” said Borel.
“Well, it is not purple now,” said Chelle, turning to face him.
“No, my love, it is not,” replied Borel, and, laughing, he swung her up and about and lowered her until their lips met in another lingering kiss.
When he set her to the ground, she fanned her face and reddened under his gaze, and as if to draw attention elsewhere, she gestured about and said, “I understand the Autumnwood has a peculiar power.”
Borel grinned and nodded. “Each of the Forests of the Seasons has its own peculiar power. In the Autumnwood, it is the season of eternal harvest. Here, let me show you.” Hand in hand, Borel led Chelle to a nearby arbor, one bearing purple grapes. He said, “Note which bunch I pluck, say, this one dangling through this particular trellis opening.” Borel reached up and picked the cluster, and he offered the grapes to Chelle and said with a grin, “Make your mouth purple, my love?”
Chelle laughed and popped in a grape, and offered one to Borel. Smiling, he reached out to take it, but she shook her head and lifted the fruit to his lips and said, “I understand the way to a man’s heart lies through his stomach,” and she slipped the grape into his mouth.
Borel chewed, seeds and all, and swallowed and softly said, “You need not feed me, Chelle, for you already have my heart.”
He wrapped her in his arms and again they kissed, and as they did so, she let fall the grapes.
Yet nestled, “Oh,” she said, and she glanced aside at the dropped bunch. “See what I have done.”
Borel laughed and released her and stepped back. “Fear not, love, there are plenty more where they came from. In fact…” He pointed above.
“Oh, my,” said Chelle, looking at the dangling cluster. “Can it be?”
“Yes, love. The Autumnwood has replaced the clutch we picked.”
Chelle turned and looked out on the moonlit garden. “What of the flowers?”
“Should we pluck a blossom, then it would reappear on its stem when none was looking.”
“Oh,” said Chelle, a bit crestfallen.
Borel frowned. “What is it, Cherie?”
“Then nothing changes in the Autumnwood? All things plucked replaced?”
Borel nodded.
“How sad,” said Chelle. “Wonderful, but in the end quite sad.”
“Why do you say so?” asked Borel.
“I repeat,” said Chelle, “nothing changes. All is static. Forever fixed. Even this garden is frozen in its display.” Chelle turned up her hands and sighed. “It seems to me that such an existence must eventually become quite dull.”
In silence they strolled to the gazebo by the stream, and as they took a seat in a swing, Chelle said, “What of weeds? Do they return when plucked? If so, then how does one care for a garden?”
“Weeds are burned, my love, or dug out entirely. Anything destroyed by fire is not replenished. To plant a garden in new soil, one has to either burn whatever was standing-burn it in place-or completely uproot whatever was there.”
“Oh. I see. Well, then, what of root crops-tubers, parsnips, onions, and such? If you harvest them-uproot them-do they not return?”
“If you unearth one normally,” said Borel, “always does some part of it-perhaps a minuscule part, a bit of hair root or stem or such-remain within the soil, and the vegetable returns.”
“Oh,” said Chelle. “Then you do not have the pleasure of turning over new soil, tilling, planting, hoeing, tending… getting your hands in dirt and watching things grow, and then enjoying the fruits of your labor. You see, for me and many others not only is there delight in seeing a garden or fiel
d in its fullness, but there is also joy in all the steps it takes to bring such a thing about. And so, to have a never-changing realm, a realm without seasons, well, it seems quite sad to me.”
A thoughtful look on his face, Borel nodded but said nothing, for until this very moment he had not considered the Autumnwood anything other than a place of everlasting harvest.
They gently swung to and fro without speaking for long moments, the only sound that of the brook murmuring past and the rustle of leaves in the faint breeze. But as the silvery light from above crept across the garden, Borel glanced at the waning moon and said, “Tell me this, my love, how do you know that there is less than a moon”-of a sudden they were back in the enshadowed turret-“left?”
Her voice trembling in dread, “Rhensibe told me,” whispered Chelle, and the stone walls began to waver, and there was nought Borel could do to hold on to the dream.
20
Mire
“Rhensibe? She said ‘Rhensibe’ told her?”
“Yes, Flic,” said Borel, scraping the hide of the marmot snared in the night, the dressed-out carcass roasting over the fire. “Know you anyone by that name?”
“No,” said Flic, licking honey from a finger. “Perhaps it’s a friend of hers, or on the other hand mayhap a foe.”
Borel scraped for moments without speaking. But then he nodded and said, “Chelle was quite frightened when she named Rhensibe, but whether it is because Rhensibe is vile or because time grows shorter, or both, I cannot say.”
“Last night the moon was five days past full,” said Flic, dipping a finger back into the honey. “That leaves a fortnight, a sevenday, and a threeday ere it is full again. Plenty of time to reach the vale and somehow win through the ring of daggers, whatever they might represent.”
“Only if we are heading to the right valley,” said Borel. “Although Chelle did confirm that pink-petaled shamrocks and blushing white roses and thorn-laden blackberries grow on her sire’s estates, I just hope that Buzzer has been there.”
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