Once Upon a Summer Day (7 page)

With a sigh, Jules, tall and dark-haired, took up Borel’s bow—its grip polished ironwood, its limbs white horn, its bowstring intertwined strands of waxed silk—and turned to the prince. “Perhaps, my lord, it was merely the groan of the wind made you dream so. It was quite fierce last night.”

“Non, my friend, not the wind, instead ’twas a sending, I am certain. She is real, and somehow we are linked.”

“And where do you propose to go?” asked Arnot.

“To Vadun. He is a dream diviner—a
devin de rêves
—and if any can unravel her location, Vadun is the one to do so.”

“But, my prince, that means going through the cursed section of the ’Wood, and Hradian lives just beyond the blight. Let me round up some men, and we will go armed with you.”

“Non, Arnot,” said Borel, taking his long-knife from Jules and belting it on and strapping it to his right thigh. “I would not put you or them in peril.”

“Then, my lord, I suggest you swing wide of her cottage,” said Jules.

Borel shook his head. “My sire asked me to find out if the witch yet dwells in her cote; you see, after Alain’s wedding, then will we raise a warband and run her down.”

“But, my lord,” said Gerard, the valet’s voice tight with stress, “you needn’t go nigh; we can send the Sprites to see if she yet resides therein.”

“Non, Gerard. The Sprites avoid the cursed section entirely; they fear to go near. And Hradian’s cottage lies on the far bound. Instead, I must go.”

“Ah, this is a scouting mission then?” said Jules.

“Indeed,” replied Borel, turning aside to take up his quiver, hence his gaze did not meet that of his armsmaster nor his steward nor his loyal valet.

“When do you plan on returning, Lord Borel?” asked Arnot.

“Before Alain and Camille’s wedding three months hence,” replied Borel, slipping the quiver baldric over his head and across one shoulder.

“My lord?”

“If Vadun interprets my dream and it is true, I have but a moon—nay, a day less than a moon—ere the lady must face her peril. At a minimum—twenty-eight days hence—I intend to be with her when that occurs, and I know not how far away lies this stone chamber surrounded by daggers dire. And so, if it takes the full of that time to reach her, and a like amount returning, then I should be back in two moons, well before Alain and Camille’s wedding. Yet I hope that I can find her ere the whole of this moon has passed, for I would spirit her safely away with days to spare.”

Jules handed the bow to the prince and stood back and examined him, then grunted in satisfaction. The prince seemed ready. But then the armsmaster frowned and said, “My lord, concerning this dream or sending—the daggers may merely be symbolic as to the threat she faces. They could represent an army besieging a palace, or other such encircling hazard. If that is true, you may need a warband or even an army to meet the peril beleaguering this damsel. If so, what then, Prince Borel?”

“I am hoping Vadun can tell me what is needed.”

Borel took up his rucksack and stepped from the armory, the three men following. They passed down long corridors to come to the welcoming hall, and thence unto the main entrance and out into the courtyard. And there awaited Borel’s Wolves, yipping and yammering and milling about, for they had sensed that another run lay ahead. How they knew the prince would be leaving this day, none could fathom, yet sense it they had, and they were eagerly waiting.

Prince Borel shouldered his rucksack and adjusted the straps to keep it from interfering with the quiver, then he slung his bow by its carrying thong and, with a final adieu to the trio, he set out across the courtyard at the Wolfpace he could sustain all day.

Shivering with the cold, Arnot, Jules, and Gerard watched until the prince passed over the flat and started down the slope beyond, and then with sighs they turned and stepped back into the warm and comfortable halls of Winterwood Manor.

All that day Borel and the pack trotted through the snow and ice, with gleeful Sprites flashing from ice-clad tree to ice-coated rock to the ice of a frozen mere or pond or lake, or of tributaries, be they rivulets, brooks, streams, or rivers. At some of these places, scattering the Sprites wide, Borel and the Wolves would pause and quench their thirst, but mostly they merely passed over the ice and continued on through the snow-laden land.

They rested for a while as the sun passed through the zenith, and then they continued on. And as they ran, the Ice-Sprites coursed with them. Yet toward midafternoon the number of Sprites dwindled and dwindled, until there was but one yet in their company, for they were nearing the cursed section.

Finally, they topped a rise, and downslope ahead stood a tangled and twisted wood, with barren, shattered, stark trees clawing at a drab, overcast sky. All was black and white and gray, no color whatsoever in the land. Even the evergreens were blasted and dead, needles gone, bleak branches broken and hanging lifeless. And there at the verge of this drear and stricken place, the Sprite flashed ahead and took up station on an ice-laden boulder and, with its face twisted in dread, it frantically gestured for Borel to stop, signing that peril lay in the desolate snarl.

Borel signalled that he and the Wolves knew the hazard of this part of the ’Wood, and trotted past the terrified Sprite and into the appalling blight.

Among the twisted trees they went, did Borel and the pack, Wolves running to the fore and flank and aft—Slate and Dark in the lead, Render and Trot to the left, Shank and Loll on the right, Blue-eye bringing up the rear. And all about was gloom and desolation and chill, a grim and silent wood. And now and again one Wolf or another would pause and raise a nose in the air, seeking the scent of peril in the surround, and then lope forward to take station again.

On they went into the fading day, the sky seeming even more dismal in this dreadful demesne. Embedded in ice and snow and looming all ’round were harsh gray rock and jagged crags and stripped, barren trees—nought but cracked and splintered and tangled wood—and clawlike branches seemed to reach out to grasp, as if clutching at these insolent travellers who dared to journey within. Yet neither Borel nor the Wolves paid heed as misshapen boughs reached forth with their fingers of twisted twigs as the day drew down toward eve.

And a candlemark or so ere sunset, Slate in the lead trotted free of the tangle, followed by Dark; and then Borel and the flankers—Render and Trot, Shank and Loll—broke out of the snarl, followed at last by Blue-eye.

And just beyond the border awaiting them in an icicle dangling from the limb of an evergreen was an Ice-Sprite. And when Borel had emerged from the gnarl, relief flooded the Sprite’s face. It was the Sprite who had accompanied the prince to the opposite side of the blight, and even though terrified, it had waited for them to safely emerge. All the other Sprites had long ago abandoned them, though somewhere farther on, somewhere beyond the reach of the cursed section, they would take up the run again.

Borel signed his thanks to the Sprite, and then—looking first left and then right—he turned leftward and trotted parallel to the tangle.

A horrified look on its face, once more the Sprite flashed ahead, this time to a frozen mere. And it signalled to the prince that menace lay to the fore, for in the near distance sat a small cottage of rough fieldstone, its roof tattered thatch.

Borel paused, and at a growled word, the pack paused as well. As he strung his bow, Borel studied the meager cote, one room at the most. There was no smoke coming from the chimney, and the air was silent.

Still the Sprite frantically gestured. Borel then signalled he knew of the peril and knew what he was doing, and, nocking an arrow, he started toward the dwelling—Hradian’s abode—the Wolves yet arrayed to the fore and flank and aft.

The Sprite accompanied them no farther, so strong was its dread, yet Borel and the Wolves went on.

The sun sank lower in the sky.

And then they came to the cote and quietly circled ’round.

There was a single door facing the blighted wood, with a window to either side, and one in the rear as well. Yet the windows were covered with scraped and oiled hide and did not permit Borel to see within.

He looked to Slate and growled a word. A rumble came in response.

Borel stepped to the door. It was latched, yet a simple pull of the string snicked it open. Borel drew his bow to the full, then kicked the door wide on its leather hinges and stood ready.

No one was in the dimness beyond.

Borel stepped inside.

He scanned about. A fireplace stood in one corner; a tripod holding a lidded iron kettle dangled over cold ashes. In front of the fireplace sat a three-legged stool. To one side was a table, and hanging from the beams above were pots and pans and utensils. Several rude shelves on a wall at hand held a small number of wooden bowls and dishes and spoons. In the shadows overhead, strings of beans and roots and turnips and onions and leeks and other such fare depended from the joists. Along one wall stood a cot, and along another wall sat a worktable with several drawers. Just above were more shelves, these with jars of herbs and simples and things that looked like parts of fur-bearing animals and insects and amphibians and reptiles preserved in a pale yellow liquid. On these shelves as well were scrolls and loose sheets of parchment. A half-full drinking bucket, the water frozen, sat on the hard-pack floor nearby, a hollowed-out gourd for a dipper hanging down from the bail.

Relaxing his draw, Borel stepped to the table and set his bow thereon, the arrow beside it. Then he took down a scroll and unrolled it. Whatever it said, he did not know, for it was written in runes unfamiliar.

Another scroll yielded the same result, though the symbols were stranger still. Another scroll and then another he opened, none of which he could read.

He unslung his rucksack and set it on the table, and placed all scrolls and parchments within. Then he began opening the drawers, and in the first he found odd instruments of bronze; what they were for he could not say. In the next were powders and what seemed to be lumps of ores, and a mortar and pestle for grinding. The next drawer yielded pressed flowers. Brushing most aside, Borel uncovered a book.

The sun began lipping the horizon, casting long shadows across the Winterwood.

In the fading light Borel opened the book. It was written in a small, crabbed hand.

Though the writing was difficult to read, still Borel quickly leafed from page to page, skimming.

Of a sudden his eye caught the words
Forêt d’Hiver.
He flipped back a page to the beginning of the entry. Though Borel could read the Old Tongue, still his progress was slow, for the hand was difficult.

Startled, Borel looked up from the journal.
Trapped? Turret? Full moon? This has to somehow be—

From the corner of his eye, Borel noted movement in the bucket near his feet. And there, under the surface of the ice, the Sprite, sheer terror on its face, signalled frantically of oncoming peril. And then the Sprite disappeared.

Borel jammed the journal into his rucksack on the table and snatched up his bow and an arrow. Nocking the shaft as he went, he stepped through the doorway and out into the long shadows cast by the nearly set sun. Alighting in the snow some fifty paces away, Hradian dismounted from her besom, the crone dressed in black, with black lace frills and trim and danglers streaming from her like tattered gloom.

Borel’s Wolves stood with fangs bared and hackles raised and growls deep in their chests.

And even as Hradian turned and looked at the cote, Borel took quick aim and loosed his shaft, the arrow to fly straight and true.