2: Lost Maiden

 

The cold rain was not hard, but it was steady. It made the stones slick and slippery. Her fingers were freezing. She pulled the leather coat tighter around her, the fur at its cuffs and neck kept in her body heat some, but it was rapidly getting soaked. She needed to find shelter soon. There must be some civilization near here somewhere, the path was far too wide and clear for a game trail. The silence of the forest, with its thin white trees, was unnerving. She stopped and looked at the endless rows of ghostly trees that seemed, in the falling dusk, like skeletal arms. She began to mutter to herself as she continued down the path, “Birch, deciduous trees with simple petioled leaves. Good for firewood. Bark can be used as paper. Sap is drinkable. Oil from the leaves is astringent and antiseptic, good for rashes. Useful trees. Not scary at all.” The forest did not answer back. No animal sounds in the underbrush, not a single bird. She shifted her pack, shivered, and picked up her pace. High stone cliffs rose on her left bordered by more of the thin trees. Then she saw the iron gate.

Something woke him. There was a someone in his forest. He could hear a soft low female voice. Lifting his huge draconian head from the rocks, he sniffed. Lavender and burnt sugar and . . . ashes? The scent was to the west, he thought. On the old road. Now what would a human be doing walking the old road?

The road ended at a huge ornate gate, which opened easily, not a single creak. It was a graveyard. She could just make out the headstones like broken rows of teeth in the ground. She stepped softly past. “Pardon me,” she whispered to the stones. “Just passing through. Don’t mean to disturb your rest.”  As if in response, the green phosphorescence on the headstones seemed to flicker. It was close on to full dark now. Hard to make out anything in the gloom around her, but were those brighter lights up ahead? She hurried toward the lights. A town, the hope of food and drink? Maybe a room.

He uncoiled his great bulk from the ledge and watched her work her way out of the cemetery and into the town. Curiosity, a thing which hadn’t moved him in ages, prompted him to rise and follow her. His scales made very little noise as they slid along the rock. He watched as she entered the town and hurried along the street toward lights that meant safety and warmth. He chuckled to himself as he shifted into smoke and followed the girl.

                                                                           ***

Heads turned toward her as the tavern door swung open. She stood for a moment, her eyes adjusting to the light. Then she stepped across the threshold. The conversation, that had stopped as she came in, immediately resumed and everyone turned back to their drinks. Still talking to herself, she stomped over to the bar. “Food first. Need to dry off. Need a room.” She looked up at the tall thin man behind the counter. “Cheese. Bread. A bowl of whatever that is in the pot that smells so good," she pointed at the cauldron on the hearth. "And a goblet of warm mulled wine, please,” she said laying three small silver coins on the counter.

“Done. And for that you can also get a piece of Mama’s Zu's pie!” The tavern keeper, a tall thin man with sallow skin, was wearing a lace-cuffed shirt with the sleeves pushed up and an embroidered weskit. “Best pie in town. Made with the last peaches of the summer!” She grinned as she watched him slice a piece of pie and add it to a plate with thick slices of cheese, and bread. “Have a seat, Miss. I will bring the stew and wine.”

She perused the room and, carrying her plate over, selected an empty table by the fireplace. Across the room there was a game of some sort going on with much laughter and friendly back-slapping between a hefty green-skinned fellow and a tiny rabbit-featured young man. A gaggle of scantily clad girls giggled as they watched. In a corner by the bar a voluptuous purple-haired girl was whispering to a dark-cloaked fellow in a floppy hat. A huge woman with tiny tusks was wiping the bar and setting out clean glasses. Settling into her chair the traveler pulled a battered book from her bag and began to read.

When the barman brought her a tray with a bowl of stew and a goblet of wine, she thanked him without looking up. After a minute she realized he was still there, looking at her. She did a mental check of herself. Her pale shortly cropped hair was a bit mussed from the wind. Her black pants and tunic a bit damp, but not so much as to cling to her figure. “Was the coin not enough?” she asked him.

“Oh no, Miss,” he smiled. “It was quite sufficient. But I was wondering. You are human, yes? What brings you to this place. We do not get many humans here. And it can be dangerous to be . . . unescorted.”

She paused before replying. “I am,” she paused looking around again, “. . . human. I am just a traveler. Is this town so very dangerous? Where exactly am I?”

He pulled up a chair across from her and began to speak in a low conspiratorial whisper. “This is the village of Lost Maiden, Miss.”

She held out her hand, “Noir. My name is Noir. And you are?”

“Alphonse, Miss. This is my tavern. We do not get many humans in these parts. Not since the Goblin King claimed the realm. This tavern is neutral ground. All the races meet here in peace . . . mostly. I just wanted to let you know that you need to be careful. There are some as don’t care much for humans. Not since the wars ended.” As he spoke a side door blew open and a cold wind filled the room. Noir looked up but saw nothing. The Tavern Keeper rose and hurriedly went to shut the door.

                                                                                  ***

He slid into the tavern on a draft. A mist of black smoke. Took a seat in a corner by the window where the shadows were deep. He saw the female sitting alone, food before her, legs crossed and a book in her lap. She was sipping slowly at a goblet that steamed and smelled of cinnamon. By elf or even human standards, she was not pretty. Her features were symmetrical, but ordinary. Button nose. Big grey eyes. Pale, nearly white, hair--cropped short and messy as if someone had cut it in a hurry. She had draped her damp coat over a chair. Beneath it she wore a black linen vest with multiple pockets, tight black leather pants tucked into boots. He stared. Those boots. Red leather, with intricate tooling in multiple colors. Slightly turned up toes. Where had he seen boots like that before?

   #3 Black Thorne Tavern >>

1: On the road

The snow was thick and her fingers were numb, but she had found a tiny cave; actually more of a dent in the mountainside. Night was falling and she had to get off the road and rest. The trek from the capital city had been quick and mostly along well-traveled roads, until she reached the mountains. Just the other side of these mountains was the village where she grew up. Her journey had been quiet, the road empty except for a few farmers going the other way, bringing their late crops to town. She had only stopped in one Inn because she didn't want to spend her coin. She didn't know when she would return to school, if at all.

Meister Ilbin had forbidden her to leave. Told her the roads were not safe. Told her to wait until spring, until she could hook up with a caravan. She had left that night, silently, stealthily, so no one could stop her. This was probably stupid. She would have been safer remaining at the academy, but she couldn't shake the feeling that she had to get home. She needed to get home. There was something wrong at home.

She set down her pack carefully as it had all her worldly goods in it, limited as those were. A couple books, her handwritten grimoire and her pens, a change of clothing, two changes of under garments, her knife and her mug, one blanket.

Her hands shook with the cold as she gathered up twigs and moss, and several dead branches from a nearby pine. She scraped the ground in front of her niche clear of snow, then she constructed her fire. A circle first, then tinder, on top of that kindling and fuel. Now for the tricky part. Holding her hands on either side of the pile of kindling she prepared to call for fire. Fire is always such an elusive element. Half the time at school she could barely call a spark, the other half she might as well set a forest ablaze. The Meisters all said be patient, go slow, but she was never one to wait. Now it suddenly struck her how dangerous this cold could be if her magic failed her.

She positioned her hands again. She reached deep in her mind and saw the fire. She envisioned the red spark, the curl of smoke, the lick of flame as it swept around the logs she had stacked. There was a loud whoosh and she opened her eyes. A huge grin split her face. She wanted to dance with glee. She had done it. Now to control it. Moving her fingers in complicated patterns she dimmed the light of the fire, but turned up the heat. With another sweep of her fingers she set a stasis spell. That should hold the flames through the night allowing her to get some sleep without having to replenish the wood or freeze to death. She relaxed her shoulders letting go of the tension she had been carrying.

From her pack she retrieved a hunk of cheese and a piece of candied ginger. She poured water into the tin cup and set it near the flames. She crumbled a handful of the mint she had gathered along the way into the cup and dropped in the ginger. While she waited for the water to warm, she nibbled on pieces of the cheese.

It wasn't so much that she was bad at magic, she reflected. It was just that her magic did not always come when she called. As if it were a recalcitrant creature with a mind of its own. For all the other students at the Academy it was just a matter of learning the right words and the right gestures. Everyone there had magic. They were the privileged ones, gifted humans touched by the divine—or so said the instructors. To be honest, Noir thought, it was more likely some accidental combination of blood and ancestry. Meister Tobin, who was the best at water magic and who could call any beast, had slightly more pointed ears than most humans. She saw his ears once when the wind snatched his hat from his head. She wanted to ask him if he had Elven blood in his family, but that was not the kind of question that was considered acceptable among the polite society of Norrebrox. When she was first brought to the school by her grandmother, she had had it drilled into her that one did not ask personal questions. There were punishments—being slapped was the least of these, losing a meal, hard chores, and having her reading privileges cut were the worst. Especially having access to the library taken away.

In her first year at the school she had gone hungry a lot until she learned not to speak out of turn. In her second and third years her tutor was Meistra Cerrida, who took it as a personal affront when Noir’s magic went awry. Noir suffered the slaps, but started to notice who among the students were never or rarely slapped. What did they have that she did not? Most of the students had registered an affinity for some form of magic by year two. The girls who had a way with plants and making things grow, almost always came from one of the seven witching families. The boys who could move metal and stone were invariably shorter and sturdier, and probably had dwarf or goblin blood, albeit diluted by generations, mixed with their human. Noir was the daughter of a witch, who was also the daughter of a witch and although she knew all the Magica Medica, the encyclopedia of plants and their properties, she would be as likely to wither an herb as to force it to bloom if she called on her magic.

In her fourth year, Noir got Meister Ilbin as her tutor. He was would never harsh and never restricted her reading, but she knew she was a disappointment to him. She could command the elements—sometimes. “Focus, Noir. Focus!” he would say. “You have the magic, you just need to concentrate on the forms!”

Magic was either in your bones, your blood, or it was not. If you had magic, you could learn to use that magic. She had magic. She felt it singing inside her. The Meisters were stunned at the level of her power—when she could get it to rise. But sometimes no matter how hard she concentrated, no matter how perfect her gestures and chants were, she could not make fire, not even light a candle. Other times when she called the flames, she got wind, or water. It was so frustrating. 

Maybe this time it was her need that brought out the fire. She did have a great need. To get to her village. To find her grandmother, Baba. To save . . . to save something. . . . She didn't yet know what it was, but it was nagging at the back of her mind. It would come, eventually. 

She rolled up in her coat, tucked her hands in the sleeves, and using her pack as a backrest she fell asleep to the dancing of the firelight. 

Her dreams as usual were of her childhood.

                                                                                               >> 2: Lost Maiden