The Forge in the Forest (28 page)

Your praise resound,

Prince of the Halls of Summer I

Lord of a court

Whose like shall not return!

At your behest

My songs have brought the past again,

And made to live

All that we loved and lost!

Yet ever more that elder music fails me,

The past grows dim and dark as prison wall.

And stronger now a newer music claims me,

The endless woods bring healing to my soul.

Now I am ever eaten up with yearning,

For freedom in the wild woods I am burning,

Within these walls I find no home,

Free, unhindered I must roam!

All praise to you,

Lord of the line of Morvan!

All that I owe

I cannot now repay!

Honor and fame

Have ever been your gifts to me,

No minstrelsy

Has praised a kinder lord.

Yet I am not the man that long has served you,

Though faithful still, I hear another call,

And I am drained of song to set against it,

Bereft of joys that held me in your hall.

Now it is torment to me to remain here,

Save for your kindness, all I find is pain here,

I beg you, loose your claim on me—

My friend, my master, set me free!

Even as the last long phrase sang from the harp it sagged
and fell, dangled limply from his fingers. He knelt and set it down gently on the flagstones, its strings still faintly ringing. Elof was shocked to see dark stains upon them, and a heavy droplet fall upon the frame: in Morhuen's struggle to play true they had cut into his very flesh. A murmur ran through the court, a soft troubled sound, and then all was silent. When at last Korentyn spoke, there was a deep tremor in his voice. "For such songs as once you made, old friend, my favor is poor recompense; you owe me nothing. If I can give you no more than leave to go, you have it, and my blessing. But may it not be long before we meet again."

Morhuen made no reply, save to bow deeply ere he strode from the hall. As he reached the high door and flung it wide, he plucked the court robe from his shoulders and flung it to one of the
alfar
waiting there. Elof caught his breath, and a deep unease grew in him. The bard's limbs, left bare by his simple green tunic, were not malformed; they were simply long, terribly long, and he had been standing hunched and uncomfortable to hide them. Yet this was, or had been, a man. The door swung to behind him.

Silence gripped the court, in confusion or shame; Korentyn stared at the bare board before him, his face pale. Around his feet
alfar
, hair and harness thick with garlands, gathered and gazed up at him with wide worried eyes. At length Kermorvan and the lord Almayn, who sat by, exchanged glances; Almayn gestured to the musicians. A flourish sounded, and they struck up a slow stately music. Couples, Kermorvan and Teris among them, rose and glided out into the formal patterns of a dance, sweeping this way and that across the floor in shifting lines as ceaseless and repetitive as waves upon the shore. Korentyn glanced up, but seemed to find little power in it to soothe him. No more did Elof; to him it was a slow torment. But barely had it drifted to its end before an older
alfar
, a mane of white hair hanging to his shoulders, gestured to the musicians quite as airily as Almayn. A drum beat out a slow rhythm; bowed strings sang a livelier tune, deeper plucked strings sounded a stamping, loping beat. A shout arose, and the
alfar
bounded out into the court. Korentyn looked up, startled, then smiled indulgently. Grinning widely, they began to circle the hall, slowly at first then faster, in a loping, bouncing run, arms held high above their heads, flicking their wrists sideways and snapping their fingers in time to the beat. Others, men and women, sprang out to join them, whirling and tossing on their long limbs like storm-sprung saplings. In a great train they wove and gamboled about the tree, wheeling and careering with such abandon that their braided hair flew wild and flung out flowers and garlands which fell among the watchers.

The sudden outburst of vitality brought laughter to Elof s lips, and a spirit of mischief; it reminded him of festivities in his own village, clumsy but cheerful, in which he had often longed to take part. "Now there's a dance!" he cried. With a swift bow to Korentyn he sprang out among the dancers, and seized a pretty
alfar
girl as she went whirling by. He barely glimpsed Ils and Roc hopping out after him before strong arms spun him away into the dance. Tenvar bounded by him with a girl on each arm, his feet scarcely touching the ground, and as Elof came round the tree once more he was startled to see some of the castle folk hovering tentatively on the edge of the throng. He had thought they might be offended, but they seemed more intrigued than scornful at this sudden eruption. At last Svethan the Mariner actually seized a partner and plunged in with gusto; others moved hesitantly after him. Elof all but stumbled as Teris tripped lightly by him, long gown kilted into its golden girdle, pulling Kermorvan after her, laughing wildly; behind them Almayn bounced along with a tall lady of the court, dignity flung like flowers to the wind.

The whole court of immortals seemed to be reveling in its lost decorum. The dance whirled endlessly on, the musicians whisking from tune to tune, circles forming, breaking, re-forming, till many had to fall back to draw breath. Elof was among them; for all his strength, he was at a disadvantage among these longer legs. His partner brushed a kiss on his cheek and bounced back into the throng; he was content to slump down beneath the great tree and let his roaring pulse settle, his dizzy head clear. Round and round they swept, woodfolk and castle folk and his friends, and as he watched them hurtle by a strange thing happened. Half-formed thoughts he had held back took shape in his mind, became a vision. It was as if the dancers sped faster, ever faster, till they merged into a bright, painful blur with a single static figure at its heart, frozen at the crest of a leap. Before his eyes it changed, burgeoned like a tree; the outflung limbs grew longer, the trunk stretched and curved upward like a supple birch, the very feet and fingers stretched out like eagerly grasping roots and tendrils. Then the vision was gone, the dance clear before his eyes. But Elof felt a sickening chill swell up in him, a growing, uncontrollable shiver. He was looking at his vision made flesh, not in one body but in all that flashed by him, in a chain, a sequence, a progression from Kermorvan to Korentyn, from him to long-limbed Merau Ladan, from him to Morhuen. And from his drawn-out, unmanageable limbs to the graceful climbing bodies of the
alfar
. And what of their minds? At best from nobility and wisdom to kindly simplicity, at worst from man to beast? Was that the true dance in the Halls of Summer?

He cursed under his breath. It still made no sense, not as long as the
alfar
had children and knew old age. How could they then be linked to the castle folk, who knew neither? He slapped a hand furiously against the rough bark.

Abruptly the walls seemed to vanish around him, the windblown trees come rushing in on him. Deep in a distant pool, intent on a treasure of glittering scales, an otter plunged; high over the borderless carpet of treetops an eagle screamed and dived, clawing.
The woodfolk are their children.

Elof swallowed, shook his head, scarcely able to speak. This was not the fluting of birds; it was the first voice he had heard, far off in the west. Only here it was no longer remote and dim; it was all around him, and it blew through his mind like a gusty wind. He should not have leaned against the tree; too much of his secret thought might al-

ready be betrayed. But
it
seemed that only his immediate thought was read.

You have clear sight, One Alone. The
alfar
are their children, or children of their kin, and they love and revere their elders, and delight in their service. But can that sight not also show you the reason for the change? For I do not hide it. Here life unending is offered to all, here they may live as they think best. Only offspring must be denied them, for children are a mirror of mortality. Nonetheless, many come to find that gift a burden; often those who grasped it most eagerly at the first endure it least easily in the end. Heroes alone may bear immortality for long, to wrest its glories from its pain
.

Elof clutched at his chest, where it seemed that a sudden stab of pain pierced him. "So that is why so many of the great names of old are gathered here! Lesser men have long since… fallen by the wayside."

Deep in the mold beneath a rotting tree a nightsown spore took root and swelled.
No. Not fallen. The longer men live, the less willingly will they embrace the idea of their death. Do not many even in hideous torment cling to that fragile cord of life? And yet they could not return to their old lives in the world outside, when all they knew there has long slipped away. So it is that 1 smooth their path before them. The wearier they grow of their lives, the less they are aware of time, the more pleasure they find in the passing moments, in the simpler things, growing more like children, like animals, as you guessed. They hunt with the
alfar,
live with them, like them; and as time, which dictates growth and change, fixes its claims upon them once more, they become more like the
alfar
in shape. The past slips from them, and they move into step once more with the great dance of nature. In the end they go off with the
alfar,
and never return; they mate with them, and bear children who are wholly
alfar,
and forget all that once they were. The mantle of mortality settles about them once again; they lead free and happy lives, knowing no difference, and in the end they die in peace, and rejoin the River
.

"But…" began Elof sharply, and then stopped short. He could only say too much.

You need not fear such an ending, for yourself or your friends. You least of all, while you burn thus from within. But even if it were otherwise, what then? Is it not worth the venture, to live longer at least than the scant span of men, with naught to fear at its end but forgetfulness and peace? To have time to hone and perfect your craft, to fulfill it with all the resource of my realm at your disposal? Alone among the ancient Powers I truly care for men. I know what is best for them
. Through the Forest floor, muffled among the rotten leaves, came the light sound of a footfall. A snake tensed its coppery flanks, its flicking tongue tasting the air for the scent of warm blood.

Elof bowed. "Not for nothing are you named the Preserver, lord. I will take heed of your bounty, and venture to stretch it further. I would go hunt metals in your mountains, with such of my friends as will come."

You have only to ask the
alfar.
They will guide you and serve you. May you find what you seek
!

Elof bowed. "Thank you, lord. I believe I will."

But it was not until the third day of their hunt, high on the rocky slopes, that he did so. For though he found many rare substances he might have need of, it was a richer prize he truly sought, the minds of his companions. "It was for that reason I brought you here," he told them.

Kermorvan nodded. "Here where the
alfar
cannot hear us, where no birds perch, where nothing grows, away from the eyes and ears of the Forest. I guessed that much. Well? What more?"

Elof looked unobtrusively over the edge of the narrow rock shelf upon which such of the company as he could gather were huddled. Far below, the
alfar
were preparing a camp among a clump of bristlecone pines. One of them glanced up anxiously, but Elof waved back with a disarming good cheer he hardly felt. He had expected Kermorvan to be horrified at hearing of Tapiau's words, yet he was as calm as ever. "What more? Is that not enough?"

"Why, pray?" demanded Tenvar. "To live forever, that's a wonder! And yet still be able to escape from it and live in peace, what's so terrible about that?"

"Aye!" laughed Bure. "Like owning land on both banks of the River!"

Kermorvan nodded, though he looked a little unhappy. "I will allow it seems strange. I would prefer to end, if end I must, as my own man, with my own mind; but perhaps that is obtuse, and I would not expect all men to feel likewise. But for others… Borhi, how would you choose? And you, Roc?"

"To live…" whispered Borhi softly, without hesitation. "Never face dying no more…"