A Glimmering Girl (14 page)

He didn’t know. He didn’t care. She lived and was real. And he would die if he didn’t find out where she had gone.

« Chapter 13 »
Candle and Goblin

Disoriented, weak with hunger, she ran.

There was no water, yet she breathed.

She had no tail, yet she moved.

With each stride, it felt more right to be in this body.
A name… a name… name.
If only she could remember her name, then surely the world would make better sense.

The fisher king followed, so close she could hear his breathing, feel his strength… and his
wanting.
She couldn’t go any faster. The freezing December air seeped into her muscles and hindered her speed.

“Cloak!” She called out the wyrd automatically, from muscle memory, and raised her hands to the sky. “Shoes!”

A green and gold cloak slid over her arms, the fabric thick and soft and warm against her bare skin. She secured the front of the garment and pulled up its hood.
Sun and moon!
Two short black boots fell,
buh-bonk,
to the ground beside her.

Igraine.
Her name was Igraine. She belonged here, in this wood. She lived in Kaelyn’s cave. The man was nearly upon her now, with his breathing and his wanting, on the other side of the tree, his back to her. He turned in a slow circle, searching.

“Invisible!” she whispered and flicked her fingers and wrists furiously. She didn’t have the strength to sustain invisibility long, but she didn’t trust that a lighter obscuration boundary would be enough, unless the man was a simpleton—and he felt exceedingly complex.

She sat down on the cold ground to put on the boots.

“Come back!” The longing in his plea tugged at her tender side. So vulnerable, almost sweet.

At the foot of the yew tree, she buttoned a boot while struggling to keep the invisibility wyrd going. The run had helped her mind to focus, but she wasn’t quite there yet. She knew she was neither falcon nor fish. She was a human woman whose heart pounded furiously. Amazing the man didn’t hear the pounding; he was mere steps away.

One boot done, she fastened the other. He looked straight at her, but he didn’t see her. Shod at last, she rose and stepped quietly out of his path, crept away, and headed for the cave.

Who was he?
She had a glimmering memory of standing by a fire and calling out his name. But how could she have, if she didn’t know it? The more she strained after the image, the more it receded. It was as if she’d acquired all the knowledge of the world in a dream and then lost it upon awakening.

The cloak kept blowing back and didn’t entirely keep out the cold. By the time she reached the cave, she was shaking. Thank sun and moon there was a good fire going inside.

A contraption above the fire pit drew the smoke and funneled it up to the surface somewhere miles away, an improvement over the previous one. Igraine had come home one day last year from exploring the woods to find the device working and a fire glowing in the pit.

She’d accused Kaelyn of being a secret genius and had asked to learn how she did it, but the old woman had always denied making the old flue, as she called it, and she denied making the improvement too. Wherever it had come from, thereafter life in the cave had been much cozier. Never so welcome as now!

Igraine hung her cloak near the fire and set the boots on the hearth. She turned her bare backside to the heat while she removed the jeweled apple blossoms and braided her hair. Yawning, she went to put on her nightgown.

She walked through the curtain of beads and bobs which separated the main living area from the sleeping area she and Kaelyn shared and laid out her hand, palm up.

“Light.”

A glow-ball pulsated in her hand and grew to about four inches in diameter, giving enough light to show the way to where she’d thrown her nightgown that morning. What a day! She wanted to collapse on the bed in exhaustion, but a thousand thoughts and feelings wouldn’t let her sleep.

Who is he? Where is he from? Will I see him again?

“Now there’s something you don’t see every day,” a familiar voice said from the other side of the room. “Isn’t it a bit cold out to be running around in the natural?”

“That it is, Kaelyn.” Igraine laughed and tossed the glow-ball into a bowl on the wall shelf. “I came out of being a fish and had to make a quick getaway.”

She slipped the nightgown over her head and adjusted her braid over her shoulder as the soft flax fabric settled over her hips and legs.

“A fish!” Kaelyn said. “Goodness. Fish are so… brainless. You could lose your mind becoming a fish. Literally.”

“I have no desire to try it again, believe me.” Something was off. Kaelyn didn’t sound right.

“I know you don’t like to be told what to do, Igraine, but a fish…”

“Kaelyn, you’re ill.” It wasn’t a question. Igraine sat down on the old woman’s bed and took her hand. The spindly fingers were colder than the room, and there was no strength in the grip, as if life was receding from Igraine’s dear teacher, sister, mother, friend…

“Ah, well…”

“What is this?” Igraine frantically ticked through well-being spells in her mind. “What’s wrong? What can I do?”

“There’s nothing wrong, nothing to do. The wyrd live long but not forever, dear, not like the fae or the fallen.” Kaelyn was weak, but her spark still danced. The smile in her eyes was disconcertingly cheerful. “I’m glad you’re here. It lifts my spirits to watch you wyrding spells just for the fun of it. Someone might think you were part fae.”

“Knock wood and spit on the devil.” Igraine countered the harshness of her tone with a forced smile. “You can’t be too bad off if you’re still telling jokes.”

But that wasn’t true. Kaelyn would laugh with her final breath.

“There’s something I need to tell you before I die.”

“Kaelyn, stop. You’re not going to die,” Igraine said. “Not if I can get you to Avalos. But how?”

“Transmogrify into a flying carpet?” Kaelyn said. “Not far below a brainless fish.”

“You joke, but if it were possible, I would.”

Igraine scanned the room, not knowing what she looked for. Just as the glow-ball died out, a beeswax candle on the bedside table spontaneously flashed aflame.

“Oh!” She jumped.

“
Ach
, that Zoelyn,” Kaelyn said. “Meddling sister.” But she chuckled as she said the words.

“She must sense something’s wrong with you.”

“She always senses something’s wrong with me, even when I’m perfectly fine.” 

True. The abbess was ever anxious for her less-gifted older sister, the rather inept wyrding woman of the cave.

“I’m sure she’s frantic.” Igraine blew out the candle and threw another glow-ball into the bowl on the wall. “Sustain.”

Kaelyn smiled like the imp she was.

“You’re exasperating!” Igraine said. “You’re so ill Zoelyn can feel it, and you think it’s a grand time to watch me throw glow-balls.”

“It’s never a bad time, dear.”

“If you hadn’t saturated the cave with all manner of obscuration wyrds, Zoelyn might have seen you earlier in her glimmer glass. She could have sent help already.”

“I like my privacy,” Kaelyn said. “And I had to use so many to make sure they’d take. You know I’m not the most powerful wyrding woman.”

“Nonsense. You do lots of things wonderfully well.”

“Care to make a list?” 

“You… um…”

“Ha!”

“You have the sight! You always know when something extraordinary is about to happen, good or bad.”

“Ah, yes. Being a good guesser is a high form of wyrd.”

“You love me.” Igraine kissed the old woman’s clammy forehead. “That’s the greatest magic of all.” She had to talk about something else or she’d cry. “Why did Zoelyn light the summoning candle? Does she doubt I’ll take you to the island? The only question is how to get you there fast. You can’t walk. With a weightless spell I could carry you, but I couldn’t sustain it all the way to Igdrasil.”

“The other candle.” Kaelyn gestured. “The crimson one. Take it out and light it. That’s why she lit hers, to make me think of mine. Oh, be glad you have no sisters, child. Always meddling…”

“Be glad you do, silly woman.” Normally Igraine would call Kaelyn a silly
old
woman.

Old woman.
Her name for Kaelyn since she’d turned thirteen and suddenly resented being called
child.
It had begun as a mean comeback, full of youthful anger and resentment, and had metamorphosed into a sweet term of endearment.

It was hard to see through her tears. Knickknacks and gewgaws covered the little table beside the bed. String. Handmade paper. A peacock feather. A small glass bottle filled with an indistinct sea-green potion.

“Ah. Here.” Under a wadded-up swatch of shimmering fabric was, indeed, another beeswax summoning candle.

She held up the crimson stub and raised an eyebrow at Kaelyn. “You keep goblin paraphernalia so casually?”

“Don’t judge,” the old woman said. “Goblins make the finest objects in the material realm. Count yourself lucky should you ever convince a gob to part with any of his treasures. Would you turn down a swatch of glimmermist?”

“No.” Igraine smiled. “But glimmermist is only a legend. It isn’t real.”

“It’s as real as
Mistcutter
—the Sword of Mist and Rain. Who do you think forged that mystical weapon?”

“A goblin.” Everybody knew that.

“The greatest goblin who ever lived,” Kaelyn said as if she personally knew the very fellow. “Light it.”

Igraine jumped to it, excited. Her exhaustion fell away. A goblin—she couldn’t wait! The candle took her wyrd gracefully, without flicker or flash. Rather than sputter and spark, the wick bloomed into flame. She could think of no other word for it but
lovely, lovely.

The smell of clean, damp earth emanated from the smoke.

“Oh, that is wonderful.” Kaelyn inhaled deeply, and in sympathy so did Igraine.

“It’s nice. Odd, but nice.”

Nothing happened.

“Should I go outside and wait?” She started toward the curtain.

“That won’t be necessary.” Kaelyn stopped her. “But come listen to me.”

Igraine sat down again, and Kaelyn squeezed her forearm—or tried to.

“Recall how you came to Avalos, dear. Can you?”

“I remember the story. I’ve heard it countless times. You were in the Small Wood collecting yew branches to make glamour dust, and you heard a baby cry. You found me at the foot of a tree and brought me to Zoelyn at the abbey.”

“There’s… more,” Kaelyn said. “A detail you were never told. When I found you, you were protected within an obscuration boundary.”

“Sun and moon, how could that be?”

Igraine had always assumed she’d been abandoned for the usual reason—because she was a lowborn female, useless, another mouth to feed. Peasants had no money for wyrds—especially not such an expensive wyrd as an obscuration boundary—and
most
especially not for a child they meant to abandon.

“The wyrd was exquisitely made. It shielded you from human and beast—and fae. It’s a wonder I saw through it. I’m no great wyrder, as you know.”

“Oh, Kaelyn, stop saying that.”

A gruff “Hello there!” sounded from the front of the cave, and a thrill shot through Igraine’s gut. The goblin, she was sure of it! She crept to the beaded curtain.

“Madam?” It was a rough, no-nonsense grumble. “Kaelyn, where are you?”

A bent creature dressed in dark clothing shuffled toward Igraine. He carried a lantern, but its glow didn’t illuminate his face. Rather, it accented shadows, now shallow, now deep, depending on how the light splashed over lines that seemed carved into his rough skin.

Hideous.
So beyond ugly that Igraine felt no fear of him, but pity. She forced herself to take a deep breath.

“Maxim!” Kaelyn called out cheerfully. “We’re in here, dear!”

The goblin pulled aside the beaded curtain. He was about a head shorter than Igraine and apparently not given to speeches. He grunted, walked past her, and scooped Kaelyn up out of her bed.

“Oh, Maxim.” The old woman giggled. “You make me feel like a girl again.”

Giggled!

“Hmph.” Maxim shuffled out of the bedroom with his bundle and toward the front of the cave.

Igraine followed. “I think she should go to Avalos. It’s an island beyond the bay. If I could just get her to Igdrasil—”

The goblin stopped and squinted at her over his shoulder. “Avalos.” He stared at her bare feet and grunted, then continued on his way out of the cave.

“Oh.” Igraine slipped on a pair of dry sandals—they would have to do—and called her cloak from the wall hook.

Outside, the goblin put Kaelyn down beside a little wagon hitched to a pony. While the old woman held the lantern, the goblin spread hay in the back of the wagon and covered it with a blanket. As if Kaelyn were light as a child, he picked her up again and laid her on the makeshift bed.

“Ooh,” she said. “This is softer than my own bed. Very nice. I should have died sooner.”