“I don’t mean to be pedantic,” I said. “But until you’ve had a Ghrelin digging around in your chest, you don’t get to talk about pain. No. I am no friend to demons. Flick, on the other hand, has shown both courage and compassion. He has saved my life and we share a life debt. I am very concerned about his health.”
“Where did you come into possession of a seed from the great tree?” She held the giant acorn out for me to look at again.
“How many hands do you have?” I asked. “You’d be amazing at Three Card Monte.” The pressure of the blade at my throat hadn’t changed and she was shifting props with the other hand faster than I could track.
“Do you not understand your life depends on how you answer my questions?” she asked, incredulously.
“Infantile response to authority,” I said. “It’s not something I’m particularly proud of.”
The blade’s pressure on my neck increased.
“The acorn,” I said quickly, recognizing I wasn’t giving her what she was looking for. “Here’s the thing. I don’t think you’re in a mood to believe the truth. I’m afraid if I tell you what’s going on, you’ll just do me in anyway. The truth doesn’t fit very well with the standard elves-running-around-in-the-forest theme you have going on here.”
“You speak very strangely,” Tempra said. “Where did you learn our tongue?”
“No idea,” I answered.
“Tell me the truth,” she said. “The seed; how did you come into its possession?”
“Help me sit up,” I said. “It is difficult for me to talk and the story is long.”
“Tempra, Captain Traux approaches,” Tannyl said.
“Your fate is no longer in my hands,” Tempra said. With little wasted effort, she replaced the gag in my mouth.
I felt vibrations on the ground as the sound of hooves approached and horses entered the small campsite.
“Captain Traux and Bulwark Amber Elendahl, I had not expected to see you,” Tempra said, almost deferentially. I smiled despite my position. I’d known more than a few who found the bended knee to be a difficult position.
“Did you not send for transportation of a sorcerer and a demon?” a tenor voice asked.
I strained my neck to see the speaker. A thin, tanned, light-brown haired man sat atop a magnificent white and brown appaloosa horse. A derisive snort caught my attention as a gray muzzled, white horse pranced forward. It was as if it had sensed my appraisal of the appaloosa and was demanding my attention. A prouder horse I’d never seen, it was two hands taller than the appaloosa with chest muscles that rippled beneath its sleek coat. A woman dressed in a shimmering white and silver mail waistcoat sat on the fiery stallion. She pulled back on the reins, correcting the great beast’s excitement, her eyes considering me intently.
“I did, Captain. I had expected someone of lesser station,” she replied.
“What have you learned?” Captain Traux asked, sliding from his horse. He dropped the reins and whispered to the horse while rubbing its long nose. I felt a small exchange of magic as he did. Even in my current state, I wondered what sort of magician he might be.
“We witnessed the sorcerer casting spells of significance. Our arrows were easily deflected by a shield he constructed with but a single word,” she said. “He also used fire magic to free himself from our nets.”
“Did he attack you?” Traux asked.
“No. We gave him no opportunity,” Tempra said.
The woman who rode the proud white horse and who Tempra had called Bulwark Amber Elendahl, expertly dismounted and laid her hand on the spirited horse’s neck. “Wild Gray, I humbly request that you not venture far. We will not rest long,” she said as she pulled the bit from the horse’s mouth.
The horse, Wild Gray, nodded its head exaggeratedly and sauntered from view.
“This is not surprising. You are a formidable opponent,” Captain Traux said. “Have you discovered the origin of the two?”
“Viessa tracked them to where the trees cease,” Tempra answered. “They were dropped. From what, we are not sure. The demon carried this.” She handed the acorn to Captain Traux.
“A seed from the great tree,” he said, surprise creeping into his voice. “I was unaware that a seed was missing.”
“And yet it is so,” she said.
“You have done well to have learned so much, Tempra,” he said.
The woman in the shimmering chain mail approached and sank to her haunches just as Tempra had a few minutes before.
“Will you attempt to fight if I remove your gag?” she asked.
I shook my head negatively. She gently removed the cloth and helped me to sit up.
“What is your name?”
“Felix Slade.” I didn’t like how out of breath I sounded. She was clearly powerful and I wasn’t making much of an impression.
“You are far from home, Felix Slade,” she said. “It is a death sentence in Gaeland to give aid to demons. What do you say?”
“Please. My friend, Flick. Is he alive?” I asked.
“This friend is a demon?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Flick is a Peutering - a demon-kind. He has no magic,” I said. “Is he alive?”
“I’m sorry to inform you, but your companion is a girl. And she is most definitely a demon,” she said.
“Tell me, please,” I said.
“She holds to life,” she answered finally. I sighed relief. “She will most likely be dispatched when we return. The Elves of the Glade take seriously their responsibility to defend this realm from demons.”
“Gaeland?” I asked.
She looked at me quizzically. “Where else?”
“I’d been hoping anywhere in the continental US,” I said.
“You have indeed traveled far,” she said. “Tell me why the Elves of the Glade should not kill you and your demon companion.”
“We pose you no threat,” I said. “We have attacked no one. We were thrown into this world and attacked without provocation. Where I come from, attacking someone because of their skin color or where they come from is bad. Not that a bunch of idiots still don’t. Wrong is still wrong though, no matter what world you’re in.”
“Why are you here, Felix Slade?” she asked.
“To find a lesser prince,” I said.
“Traux, I ride for Castle Parnassus,” the woman said, standing suddenly. “I will carry the demon girl.”
“Yes, Milady,” he answered. I’d originally thought the two were a pair. Captain Traux’s face and the tone of his voice communicated respect, but also longing.
“You should expect a visit from the Wizard Sam Elendahl,” Bulwark Amber said to Traux. “King Parnassus will want an audience with this sorcerer who hails from his home world.”
“Tell Sam I will make for The Glade in the morning,” Traux said.
“Very well,” she said and whistled softly. A moment later, the white horse, Wild Gray, pranced into the camp. “Felix Slade, we will see you two days hence at Castle Parnassus. If you have any sense of self preservation, you will do as bade until then.”
I nodded my head in agreement. The Bulwark Amber, having climbed onto her majestic steed, accepted help from Captain Traux, who lifted an unconscious Flick to her. My throat constricted as I saw Flick’s pallor. Her normally bright, black skin had grayed and her chest drew only shallow breaths. The broken shaft of an arrow protruded from her. I could not see how she would make a two hour, much less a two-day trip on horseback.
Without further hesitation, Amber rode off into the night.
“Give him water and food,” Traux said. “Then bind his mouth.”
“What happened?” Tempra asked. “The demon must be dispatched. Where is Milady taking it?”
“As you know, The Bulwark does not answer to me,” he said. “We will do as the lady requires. Felix Slade, you should sleep. We have a long journey ahead.”
I gratefully accepted the water offered to me by Tannyl. I could sense no animo
sity from the elf who’d, earlier that day, fired arrows at me. My hands were bound so he had to pour the liquid into my mouth. I drank as much as he had to offer.
“Are you able to eat?” he asked.
“I am,” I said.
“This is travel bread,” he said and placed the end of a thin loaf into my mouth. I suspected, if I had eaten anything in the last couple of days, I might have found the bread to be bland. Under the circumstances, however, it, along with the water, was delicious.
“Are you cold?” Tannyl asked.
“No. I do not get cold easily,” I said.
“You had better think about how you will defend yourself against the charge of aiding the demons,” he said quietly, sitting next to me as he helped me to eat and drink. “The King is fair, but he is sworn to uphold the law of our land.”
“Who was that woman on Wild Gray?” I asked. “You called her The Bulwark.”
“That is the King’s protector,” he said.
“Enough, Tannyl,” Traux said.
“Yes, sir,” Tannyl put away the food and water, replaced the gag and tipped me back down so that I lay on my side. I stared at the fire as the night progressed and the elves took turns on watch.
I was surprised when a gentle hand shook me awake. Light was just filtering through the trees and the recently doused fire smoldered where it had burned the night before.
“I will give you your hands, Felix Slade, yet I will not hesitate to impale you if you cause me difficulty on our trip down the mountain,” Traux said. I couldn’t help but notice his mood had changed since the woman, Amber, had left with Flick.
With Tannyl’s help, I was placed behind Traux on the appaloosa. I still wore the gag, yet could hardly blame the elves. If they knew what I was capable of, I wouldn’t be allowed to ride at all.
The forest we rode through continued to grow denser as we descended in elevation. My breathing, while still painful, became easier as the sweet-smelling air thickened.
It wouldn’t have taken me long to discern we were on another world, even if we hadn’t run into the elves - or more accurately, they hadn’t hunted us down. The plants, while not unfamiliar, were all wrong. Ferns that shouldn’t stand an alpine existence, grew in abundance, and many species of fungi were downright gigantic. I even thought I caught glances of small beings entering the base of mushrooms as we ran up on them unexpectedly.
Several hours into the trip, Traux finally stopped next to a stream. “We’ll rest Brownie for a period,” he said as he slipped from the horse. I nodded as I swung my leg over Brownie’s back. “Eat this.” He handed me a small loaf of the traveler’s bread I’d had the night before and undid my gag.
“I will not cause you harm, Captain Traux,” I said as my legs wobbled on the firm ground “You do not need to gag me as we ride.”
“You are breathing easier. What condition has caused the stone to creep across your arm?” He handed me a wooden cup and mimed scooping water from the stream.
I drank a full cup before responding. “It is my own doing,” I said. “I was impatient and my friends were in danger. I used an enchantment I did not understand and now it is killing me.”
He smiled wryly. “If we could only undo mistakes of our past.”
“I’d be satisfied to survive them at this point,” I said.
“I’ve said that very thing.” Whatever had caused his sour mood was lifting. “You are from the United States then?”
“I am. Moved to Leotown last year. Near Ashville, North Carolina before that,” I said.
“I grew up in Virginia,” he said.
“Seriously? You seem so…”
“Elvish?” he offered.
“Yeah, that,” I said, chewing on the bread he’d provided. It was just as good as I remembered from the night before.
“There was a time when we were cut off from Gaeland. The House of Parnassus has a property not far from Ashville,” he said.
“Crazy we’d meet here, in that case.”
“Faerie has a way,” he said.
“How far are we going?” I asked.
“We will part ways here,” he said. “You will make the remainder of the trip with Wizard Elendahl.”
“I thought we were headed to The Glade,” I said.
“Amber must have made contact, as the Wizard is almost upon us.” He pointed down the path where a blurred figure approached with incredible speed.
“That’s the Wizard?” I asked.
“Sam Elendahl.” A young man appeared in front of us and stuck out his left hand confidently. “You’re a wizard?”
I shook his hand. “I am.”
“Are you evil?” he asked, sliding his hand onto my wrist, seeking to read my blood. It was a presumptuous move that I would have resisted, but I was flagging and had little resistance left in me.
“I don’t know,” I said. It was a completely honest answer. The darkness within and my recently discovered affinity to Kaelstan gave me pause.
“Faerie is all around us, Felix. It leads us to those who need our help. Do you really believe it was coincidence that Tempra and her patrol happened to be so close when you arrived? Or that Captain Traux and Amber were headed up the mountain at the same time?” he asked.
I tried unsuccessfully to pull my hand free. I outweighed the man by forty pounds, but his grip was deceptively strong. “I don’t know about Faerie magic.”
“Why are you here, Felix Slade?” Sam asked.
“I am to find a lesser prince,” I said.
“The Lesser Prince is a derisive title that refers to my friend Tigerious Parnassus, king of this realm,” Sam said. “And yet I feel no animosity from you. We will proceed as my sister requires.”
“Not big on details, are you?” I said and this time pulled my hand free.
Unexpectedly, the wizard who called himself Sam, wrapped his arms around Traux in a hug. “Always wonderful to see you, Traux.”
“Will you be safe with Felix Slade?” Traux asked.
“Felix Slade will be no trouble,” Sam said, looking at me pityingly.
Chapter 17
Castle Parnassus
“This is going to feel weird,” Sam said, smiling. The young man couldn’t be more than twenty years old, although his fair skin and lack of facial hair made him appear younger. He dressed simply, wearing a green linen shirt, leather pants, tall boots, and a thick linen cape.
I found talking difficult and chose to nod as I grasped his outstretched hand. Weird didn’t begin to describe what I’d later learn was the Wind Walk spell. It was a spell unique to practitioners of Faerie magic, turning the caster and any number of connected passengers into a translucent fog.
The benefits of Wind Walk were numerous. First and foremost was that without physical form, I no longer labored to breathe. The relief was sudden and very welcome. The second thing was that our travel speed increased tenfold. We simply flowed down the path as a leaf in front of a great wind. I observed that while we traveled, we didn’t go through things as much as we went around them.
Time was difficult to track, but twenty minutes into our trek through the heavy forest, we overtook a single rider on a horse. While the rider was traveling at great speed, we easily caught up to her, causing her to slow to a stop.
“How is she, Amber?” Sam asked, breaking the spell. The rider held the unconscious Flick in front of her.
I staggered as my feet landed on solid ground and heaviness once again settled onto my chest.
“There is no change. The demon is quite ill,” she said. “We will travel with you back to Castle Parnassus. Take the darkling so I can get off.”
As I approached, the white stallion stamped its feet and bobbed its head, blowing steam through wide nostrils.
“I’ll take her,” I said, accepting the unconscious Flick from Amber. Her tail slid lifelessly off the saddle and dragged on the ground as I cradled her in front of me. Shallow breaths were the only signs of life.
Amber swung of
f the fidgety horse and ran a familiar hand beside its cheek and onto its long, proud neck. “Find me at the castle, Gray,” she whispered.
“We’re outta here,” Sam said, grabbing my arm first, then catching Amber’s as we set off down the trail again. I found I was unable to communicate while we traveled, so I focused on the rapidly passing terrain. While under the spell’s effect, the world lost most of its color, turning a bluish gray. The trees continued to grow larger as we traveled deeper into the forest. At least twice I saw dwellings among the branches, joined by long, swinging rope bridges.
After half an hour, we exited the forest, crossed a wide, blue river, and then plunged back into another forest that didn’t seem quite as ancient as the one we’d just left. Here, the trees were well developed and mature, but weren’t as tall.
Our journey halted as quickly as it had started. We’d covered two days of travel by horse in only a matter of hours. Sam deposited us in front of a great wooden gate set into walls that soared thirty feet into the air and stretched hundreds of yards in both directions. Bastions and periodic arrow slits were the only things that interrupted the otherwise smooth stone walls.
“East Gate of Castle Parnassus. No getting through, even with Wind Walk,” Sam explained. “Hail the gate.”
“Hail the wizard,” a high-pitched voice answered.
“Open the door, Jar,” Sam replied.
There was more to Sam and Amber than I’d been told. Sam’s speech was sometimes formal, like the elves, but just as often his words sounded very much like he was from Earth.
“You’ve a demon. I’ll not be opening the gate,” the disembodied voice replied.
“I have responsibility for the demon,” Amber called out.
“Are you sure?” A small, five-inch square wooden panel, which had seemed like part of the door at about eye level, swung back to reveal a tiny, round face. The man who looked out at us couldn’t be over a foot tall.
“I am sure, Jar,” Amber replied. “The demon is badly wounded.”
“It should be dead,” Jar replied. “The king will see to that soon enough, though.”
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