Once Upon a Summer Day (24 page)

“Do you really think that someone in town might know something of Rhensibé and where Lord Roulan’s estate might be?” asked Flic.

Borel shrugged. “Perhaps. Then again, mayhap we can find one of the Fey Folk that Maurice spoke of. If they are truly Fey, then they might know of something that will give us an inkling as to where to go next.”

“Perhaps,” said Flic. “Yet if I were you, I’d be careful of what Fey Folk say.”

Borel broke out in laughter.

“What?” said Flic.

“Oh, Flic, my innocent. Don’t you realize that you are as Fey as any? Should I be wary of your words?”

“Humph!”
snorted Flic. “I should say not. After all, I am not speaking of Sprites and such, but of the
true
Fey Folk.”

“
True
Fey Folk? And just who might they be?”

“Well, um, er . . . oh, I know: Fairies, that’s who. Those and—” Flic’s words jerked to a halt, but then he whispered, “Oh, my, perhaps that’s one of them now.”

Flic pointed, and just ahead on the riverbank sat a crone, mumbling to herself and picking at her considerably long nose.

As Borel drew near, she whirled about and screeched, “Where have you been! It’s quite late, you know, and I can’t wait here all day.”

“M
adame,” said Borel, “are you speaking to me?”

“Of course, you fool,” snapped the partly bald, scraggly-gray-haired, warty-headed crone, the old lady dressed in filthy rags, wooden-soled sandals on her dirty, misshapen feet, the shoes held on by half-rotted leather straps across her insteps. “Do you see anyone else here?”

“I am here,” said Flic. “I am someone else, and so is Buzzer.”

“Pah!” sneered the wrinkled hag. “You little pip-squeak, you can’t carry me across the river, while this big lummox of a man can.”

Flic frowned. “Pip-squeak? You call me a—?”

“You wish me to bear you across, Madame?” said Borel, interrupting Flic.

“Have you no ears, or are you total a dolt? Didn’t I just say so?”

“Leave her be, my lord prince,” said Flic, now thoroughly irritated. “Let the old fool wade.”

“Is that food you’ve got in the sack?” queried the snaggletoothed crone. “I smell food, and I am hungry.”

“Indeed, Grandmother,” said Borel. “Let me offer you some.” He unslung the cloth bag from his shoulder and untied the rope and held the sack out to the old woman, its top open. “What will you have?”

She snatched the pouch from his hands and began wolfing down biscuits and cheese, and drinking honey straight from the jar.

“My lord,” cried Flic, “take it back from this old beldame, else she’ll gobble it all up.”

The hag clutched the sack to her bosom and turned away from Borel so that he couldn’t easily grab it from her.

As she cracked open a boiled egg, Borel said, “She’s hungry, Flic, and I can always hunt, and you and Buzzer can always sip nectar.”

“Bu-but she’s eating it all!” exclaimed Flic.

“Nevertheless,” said Borel.

’Round a mouthful of apple, and over her shoulder, the crone snarled, “Swat that little pest. Swat the stupid bee as well.”

As Flic, thoroughly infuriated, hissed in rage, Borel said, “Non, Madame. Flic and Buzzer are my friends and my guides and my allies. I’ll not do them harm, nor shall you.”

“Friends? Guides? Allies? Ha! Then you are a fool thrice over,” sneered the hag.

“My lord,” gritted Flic, the Sprite seething, “let me set Buzzer upon her, and then we’ll see just who is the fool.”

“Non, Flic,” said Borel. “She is old, and a bee sting might kill her.”

“Good riddance, then,” growled Flic, but he made no move to carry out his threat.

The crone turned and shoved the sack back into Borel’s hands. “Now carry me across,” she demanded.

Borel peered into the bag. Only the salted bacon and an empty honey jar remained.

Borel sighed and retied the bag and looped the sling over his head and across his shoulder again. Then he turned to the old woman and started to pick her up in his arms.

“You fool!” she screeched. “You might drop me that way. Instead I will ride on your back.”

“Leave her,” screamed Flic, “the ungrateful old witch that she is.”

But Borel sighed and turned his back, and the crone climbed up, complaining about the quiver and bow and rope slings and the Gnome rucksack belted to Borel’s waist all being in the way. But finally she was in place.

Flic would have none of this, and he and Buzzer took to wing.

“Well, are you just going to stand there all day?” snarled the crone, a gust of her breath nearly gagging the prince.

Following the trace of the road, into the river stepped Borel, the ford wide and slow-running. Up to his ankles, his shins, his knees rose the water as he bore the old lady across, she breathing at his ear, a miasma of foulness swirling forth from her snaggletoothed mouth. And with every step she seemed to grow heavier . . . and heavier . . . and then heavier still.

Up to his thighs rose the water, and the crone screeched that her feet were getting wet, and she climbed higher, her knees gripping his waist.

Onward waded Borel, while Flic circled above and shouted that the prince ought to simply dump the whining old hag. So what if she drowned, it would serve the ancient carp right.

And still she seemed to get heavier with every step.

“My shoe!” screamed the crone. “You’ve made me lose my shoe! Get it! Get it!”

Borel looked and saw the wooden-soled sandal drifting toward an eddy. “Madame, it is merely a
sabot
, a wooden clog, and easily replaced.”

“No, no, it’s my shoe, and your fault that it is floating away! Get it! Get it now!”

“Dump her!” shrilled Flic. “Let her bob along after it, or better yet, let her sink out of sight, never to be seen again.”

Sighing, Borel turned and waded after the sabot, the water deepening, the crone on his back and screaming at him that she was getting wet. Finally, Borel overtook the shoe and, waist-deep, he waded for the shore, while the hag on his back screeched, “Get me out! Get me out! I am like to drown!”

“Let her!” shrieked Flic, flying above, Buzzer circling alongside. “Let the old harridan drown!”

With the crone squalling and Flic screaming, at last Borel reached the far bank and trudged up out of the water.

The hag scrambled off his back, but held on to Borel while standing on the one foot still sandal-clad. “My shoe,” she demanded, “put my shoe on my foot!”

“Throw it back in the water instead,” shouted Flic.

With her yet holding on, Borel knelt and she raised her hammertoed, broken-nailed, dirt-encrusted, bunion-laden foot to receive the worn and wet sabot. And as he slipped it on, her foot became slender and graceful, and the shoe turned to silver. And even as Flic gasped and cried, “Oh, my,” Borel looked up to see not a withered crone, but instead a graceful silver-haired, silver-eyed demoiselle of surpassing beauty, arrayed in a silver gown.

And above the sound of the river and just on the edge of hearing, it seemed he could faintly detect the sound of a shuttle and loom, as if someone nearby were weaving.

“Lady Wyrd,” he said yet kneeling, and she canted her head in assent.

“Lady of the Mere,” he added, and once more she acknowledged the name.

“Lady Sorcière,” he said, and again she nodded.

Finally, he said, “Lady Skuld,” and she smiled.

“I am known by many names, Prince Borel,” she said, “those among them.” She turned her silver gaze toward a nearby frond on which Flic sat, his face in his hands, Buzzer at his side. “Sieur Flic,” she said.

Flic mumbled, “Didn’t I tell you, Lord Borel, when we first saw her waiting on the bank of this river that she might be one of the Fey? Well, she is, she certainly is. Too bad I didn’t listen to me.”

He dropped his hands from his face, and stood and bowed. “My Lady of the Yet to Come, I apologize for all I said. Had I but known—”

Skuld laughed, her voice as silver as her hair and eyes. “Ah, my Flic, I must play my games.” She turned to Borel. “You, Sieur, you did very well, for ere I can aid, a favor must be given, and you were tested sorely.” She held out her hand to him.

Borel stood and bowed and said, “My lady.” He took her hand and kissed her fingers.

“Ah me,” she said, smiling, “are you trying to turn my head?”

“No, my lady, though I would ask you for guidance in the quest I pursue.”

“I know your quest, Lord Borel, and it is worthy.”

“Will you help me, Lady Wyrd? I need aid, for I know not where my Chelle lies, nor where lies the manor of her père, and there is little time left.”

Skuld sighed and said, “My sisters and I are bound by a rule: no answers of significance or gifts of worth can we give to anyone without first a service of value being rendered to us—which, in my case, you have certainly done, bearing me across the river as you did.”

“Um, begging your pardon, my lady,” said Flic, “but he gave you food as well.”

“Indeed, he did, and that’s two
beaux gestes
,” said Skuld. “Even so, my sisters and I, we cannot grant favors until a riddle we ask is correctly answered, and even then our answers will be couched in mystery.”

“My lady,” said Borel, “any answer is better than what we now have . . . and to be fair, I know the riddles you and your sisters asked Camille, as well as their answers. Too, I know the answer to the riddle of the Sphinx.”

“Honorable,” murmured Skuld. Then she turned and looked at Flic and smiled. “Do you fly in races ’gainst other Sprites?”

“Oh, yes, and I’m quite good at it,” said Flic, beaming.

Now Skuld turned to Borel and said, “Here then is my riddle:

“What?” Flic started to protest, but Skuld threw up a hand to stop him—

“Oh, I know, I know!” cried Flic, jumping up and down on the frond, Buzzer bouncing beside him.

“ ’Tis not yours to answer, Flic,” warned Skuld.

Again she turned to Borel, and he said, “Flic would then be second.”

Skuld grinned and nodded. “Well answered, Borel.”

“What?” cried Flic. “Second? But I passed that one. Why not first?”

Borel smiled and said, “Flic, my lad, when you pass the second-place Sprite, you have not yet passed the one who is first, hence, you would be second.”

“Oh,” said Flic, his face falling. “I thought I would have been in first.” Then he sighed and said, “It’s a good thing it wasn’t my riddle to answer, for I seem to be no good at it. I mean, I didn’t know what women want, nor could I choose between night and day, and—”

“Flic, you are a valuable member of this quest,” said Borel. “Again I say, without you and Buzzer, I wouldn’t be here.”

Flic grinned and said, “That’s true. Besides, it wouldn’t have been but a moment before I would have passed that Sprite in first place anyway.”

Both Borel and Skuld laughed at Flic’s cockiness, but Borel then turned to Skuld. “My lady . . . ?”

Skuld smiled. “Ah, yes. Aid.”

She pondered a moment and then said: “Heed me, Borel:

“And this I will add for nought: you must triumph o’er a cunning, wicked, and most deadly steed to find the Endless Sands.”