Gossamyr (6 page)

Drawn prematurely from her attempt, Gossamyr twisted at the waist.
There he was
again.
The man with the eerie blue eyes and
clinking silver charms about his neck. Had he traveled a circle? This
forest, dense and large, would surely require any casual traveler
much time to circumnavigate—even should his journey spiral. Was
mortal time so spectacular then?

Time is the enemy.

"What sort of witchery be this?" the man said as he
heeled his mount beside Gossamyr.

Her fingers toyed with the carvings on the staff, and one hand
flattened to her throat. "You jest with me."

"I beg that I do not, my lady. I traveled straight; there was
not a turn in the road. And yet—"

"No time passed?"

"Exactly." Pressing a hand over his brows to shade his
view from the setting sun, he peered at her. A flicker of ruby
flashed in his ring. "I do not believe your sparkle is merely
the sun—"

"Impossible you did not turn and cut back through the
forest."

He shrugged, and the hood of his cloak fell to his shoulders to
reveal a scatter of tangled hair and a trickle of crimson running
from temple to ear. Might have been scratched by a branch, so small
the cut. Yet there, to the side of his right eye, a bruise the color
of crushed blackberries tormented the flesh. What had the man been
to? Fighting? Defense?

"Be gone with you, stranger," Gossamyr said. She had
enough to sort through without him tangling her thoughts, making her
wonder when wonder was best abandoned to focused attention.

The buzz of the fetch zoomed past her face, too quick for a mortal
to regard as any other than an insect. Shinn kept watch.

"Ride straight and do not look back."

With a surrendering splay of his hands, the man huffed out a grand
sigh. "As the lady wishes. I've my own sorrows to keep me this
day." He again heeled the mule. With a bristle of its dirty hide
the beast carried its master onward.

Over the rise in the road, Gossamyr watched and listened keenly
for his return, for a signal he veered from the path and into the
underbrush that paralleled the pounded dirt. A bluefinch soared
overhead, chirring a greeting that made her smile. Exactly as the
birds in Faery. The bird verified the traveler neared the edge of the
forest—

"Tis a spell!"

Behind her, Jean Cesar Ulrich Villon III reined the beast to a
halt and jumped to the ground. Fists planted akimbo, he looked over
the mule, then up the verdant wall of the surrounding forest.
Gossamyr thought she heard him mutter, "The same."

"Be you a witch?" he called.

"Most certainly not." That would imply she dabbled with
forbidden magic! She stomped over to him and jabbed her staff under
his chin. "Tell me true, you traveled straight?"

He nodded, raising his spread hands to his shoulders to keep them
in view. Small cuts gashed his palms and wrists. Had the man battled
his way out from a prickle bush? Where then had he found such a nasty
bruise?

Gossamyr scanned the forest, seeking a tear in the curtain to
Faery where perhaps a sprite might be seen spying on his mischievous
deed. Wide hornbeam leaves remained still as stone. Tree trunks
gripped the earth, silent stately sentinels. Pale ivy twisted about
the grasses and journeyed toward the toadstool circle. Not a dryad in
the lot.

Gossamyr could not be sure if it was because she no longer stood
in Faery, or simply, the Disenchantment befell more quickly than
expected. She saw nothing out of sorts.
Save that everything was
horizontal.

"Pisky led," she decided, then snapped the staff away
from the man's chin.

"What?" Ulrich followed her as she turned and stalked
down the rough path away from him. "I've not seen a pixy."

"Pisky," she corrected sharply.

"Piskies, pixies, what have you!"

"They are very different. Piskies fly, pixies... they
trundle. As well, pixies do not glimmer."

"Only thing I've seen that glimmers of the enchanted is you,
my
lady. On your neck there— Oh, Hades!" He clamped
a palm to his forehead. The action resulted in a yelp, for obviously
his bruised face pained him. "Not again! Pray, tell you are not
a damned faery."

Gossamyr winced at the unfamiliar word. Not a favorable oath, she
guessed from his tone.

"You are not? You cannot be. Dragon piss!" He pressed
beringed fingers between them in an entreaty. "Have they sent
someone to bring me back? Where are they? Do they lurk? No! I will
not go. I refuse!" He curled his fingers and wrung the balled
fist at Gossamyr. "Your kind have done enough to foul my life."

"I am n-not a faery," Gossamyr managed. She pressed a
hand to her throat where the blazon was visible,
They keep them
chained in cages.
"No, not faery," she reiterated more
confidently.

"You lie, trickster! Your sort never speak the truth, only in
circles." The man drew tiny frantic rings in the air before him.
"Circles, circles, circles. Oh, but those damned circles! It is
not the same! Changed, damn them all. It has all changed!"

"Believe me or not," Gossamyr said over his ranting. "I
am m-mortal, like you." A quick twist of her fingers clasped the
highest agraffe on her pourpoint, closing the vest to an
uncomfortable tightness.

"Mortal?" He jerked a sneer at her. "My lady, we
mortals
do not have occasion to call ourselves mortals. We are
men, women, coopers, bakers, fishermen—but never do we say
mortal.
Tavern keepers, tanners, magi and—"

"Enough! I am...a woman then." Yes, he must see that!
She managed an awkward curtsy—a quick bend of one knee—and
forced a smile. "Are you well pleased?"

"Pleased? To stand in the presence of a faery?"

"I am not!"

"What of your clothing?"

"What of it?"

He peered closely at her. Gossamyr controlled the urge to reach
for the discoloration on his cheek. Did it feel hot? Tender? What
did
a mortal feel like? His face was such a display of movement and
lines and sighs and outburst. So emotional!

Oblivious to Gossamyr's curiosity, Ulrich eyed the sleeveless
pourpoint, slid over the applewood sigil propped on her hip, then
stretched his gaze back up her neck. Stuffed with arachnagoss and
sown in a fine quilting, the garment protected from sharp or slashing
weapons.

He finally said, "Are those leaves sewn together?"

Clutching the rugged fabric fitted snugly to her body, Gossamyr
lifted her chin. "Mayhap," she offered stubbornly, thinking
a lie would be just that—so obvious. Lies served nothing but to
prolong the inevitable bane. But the truth of her was a necessary
misappropriation, lest she find herself in a cage rotting in a market
square.

"Leaves! Marvelous!" A brilliant smile revealed white
teeth and he clapped his hands together—but the smile
straightened sharply, as did his mood. "Well, I am not going
with you."

"I did not ask your accompaniment, mort—er, Ulrich."

"So be off then." He shooed her with a flip of his
fingers. "Back to Faery where you belong."

"Do you not hear well?"

"Perfectly."

"Mayhap you are daft? I said I am n-not a faery. It is
ridiculous of you to assume as much." Gossamyr crossed her arms
over her chest and assumed a defiant stance.

"What then places you here in my path, charming my mule to
return at your bidding? If that is not faery glamour, I don't know
what is. Have not your kind toyed with me enough?"

"What torments have you suffered at the hands of Faery?"

"You don't know?" A skip to his right, his feet nimble
and sure, twirled him around once and ended with a mock bow. The man
changed moods so quickly he was either barmy or a lackwit.

He blew forcefully from his mouth, which fluttered his lips into a
slobbery sound. "Is not a dance of the decades damage enough?
Oh!" He thrust up his arms, then as quickly, snapped into a wary
crouch and scanned the dense forest. "Am I in Faery now? If you
mean me no harm then get me gone from here. I command it of you,
wicked faery!"

Gossamyr rolled her eyes at his dramatics—then narrowed her
gaze on him. The remarkable thing about the man was not the bruises
and blood but that contour of hair above and below his mouth. Fée
men did not sport facial hair. It wasn't necessary, for, unlike
dwarves, they did not require body hair to protect from the elements.
And those eyes. Blue, a color Gossamyr had never before looked into.
Her mother's brown eyes were the only anomaly from the fée
violet. And her own. So much color twinned on the man's face, and
yet, that color drowned in a sea of white.

"We stand in the mortal realm, Jean Cesar, er—"

"Ulrich Villon. The third—hell, what am I doing? I have
just given my name complete to a faery!"

If he only knew how little glamour she could wield with that
information.

A poke of her staff into the ground spoke her impatience. "Not
a single faery taunts you this day." Or so he must believe. But
he seemed to know about her kind. And the forest, it seemed not to
want him to leave her side.

Hmm... An enchanted bane or boon? She must...test. If he could
leave her, then it was mere coincidence. If he again returned to her
side, then they were meant—for reasons beyond her grasp—to
travel together. It is all she could figure with so little experience
of this realm.

"Get back on your mule and ride off. I will follow you over
that ridge in the path to ensure your success."

"She is not a mule," the man offered as he mounted. His
shoes, strapped and circled in thin leather ties, grazed the grass
tops.

"Fancy is a rare breed, yet while lacking in height makes up
for it in endurance."

Fancy? A miserable waste of horseflesh. But Gossamyr did not speak
her annoyance. Surely the only reason for the man's return to her
twice over was that someone or thing in Faery saw to make mischief
with her. But to speak to Faery—the trees, as the man would
view it—would not put her to advantage. And where was the fetch
when she needed to communicate?

Gesturing the mortal and his mule follow, Gossamyr walked up the
path. At the rise, she saw the forest stretched ahead for endless
lengths. Not a visible root or marsh kelpie in sight. Impossible he
had traveled the distance and returned to her side in so little time.

Could Shinn be behind this? What reason had her father to place
this man in her path? He had wanted her to accept a guide...

"You are a faery," Ulrich muttered, the mule ambling to
make pace with Gossamyr's light-footed strides. "I know it. I am
not going with you, foul one."

"Suits me fine and well. I have no need of such misery to
accompany me on my travels, you barmy bit of breath. Go. Once more,"
she said as the man passed her by. And then he was gone.

Assuming a defiant stance, shoulders back and one knee slightly
bent, Gossamyr counted her breaths, waiting, wondering. A strum of
her fingers across the dangling
arrets
produced a multitude of
obsidian clicks. Deadly aim, Shinn had once remarked of her skill.
She'd taken the prize in tournament three years consecutive.

With a sigh, she shook away the sudden rise of apprehension
created by her encounter with the mortal. Time threatened. Her father
and his troops must battle more revenants even as she stood here.

She felt a familiar presence first at the base of her skull, the
prinkles of warning, of sure knowing.

Gossamyr reluctantly turned to face where she had started her
adventures in the Otherside. There lumbered her pisky-led mule and
rider. It was too ridiculous to wonder. And so she loosed a chuckle
and splayed her arms out in surrender.

"It appears I am destined to remain at your side,"
Ulrich called. "Oh, to tap into the source of such magic!"
Then he narrowed his blue gaze on her and muttered, "Mayhap I
will, luck be with me."

"I possess no magic." And that was truth. Magic was a
mortal device, forbidden in Faery. (Though there were those who
dabbled.) For every use of magic, be it good or for evil, tapped
Enchantment. Mortals literally stole Enchantment (most unknowing) to
conjure their spells and charms and bewitchments. Should a fée
be accused of dabbling, banishment was immediate.

"I do not know why you lie, faery, but I will allow you are a
lone woman who must protect herself. Of course, lies be the way of
the faery."

"Faeries do not appeal to you?"

"Faery circles, my lady. And we are far from— Yei-ih!"
He flicked his gaze back and forth between Gossamyr and the ground.
"What is that? It's...that's it. A toadstool circle?"
Ulrich heeled the mule, but it remained stubbornly stationed beside
the Passage from which Gossamyr had disembarked. "Move, beast!
Get thee gone!"

Gossamyr reached out. A tweetering whistle enticed the mule to
wander toward her as she walked widdershins down the path. "They
are merely toadstools. No harm will come to thee."

"Speaks one who has not danced!"

A Dancer? Gossamyr peered at the mortal, seeing him newly. Much as
she loved her parents and her home, she had ever been curious about
the mortal realm. A curiosity that had flowered since the day she'd
witnessed a Dancer. So very much like herself. Wingless and clumsy,
with a lumbering body that had made his dance steps wobble—almost
as if the air was too heavy for him to acclimate.

Had this man really Danced? Or did he merely babble nonsensities?
To make a determination proved yet difficult. Too new this mortal
realm, and this man but her first mortal. Nothing to compare him to.
He could be luna-touched for all she knew.

But he had returned to her side, thrice over.

"You have been placed in my path for a reason. I must accept
and move on, for urgency is fore. Come!" The mule followed as
she walked onward. "Do you ride to the nearest village?"
she asked, her pace slowing to mirror the mule's laborious trudge.