Once Upon a Summer Day (25 page)

Borel frowned, taken aback by her answer, and he said, “My lady, I do not under—”

But in that moment the persistent sound of the loom swelled, then vanished as did Lady Skuld.

“S
he’s gone,” said Borel.

“Vanished into thin air,” said Flic, his mouth yet agape. Then he scowled. “Isn’t it just like fate to strike unexpectedly and then as quickly disappear and leave the victim—or beneficiary—to deal with the consequences?”

“You are right, Flic. None knows when the Fates will come and go, nor whether they might bring good or ill.” Borel sighed and shook his head. “But this I wonder: whenever they speak, why can’t the Fates—the Ladies Wyrd and Lot and Doom—ever answer straight out? Why must they always couch their words in riddles?”

“I don’t know,” said Flic. “However, my prince, it seems to me that Lady Skuld
did
tell you something of worth.”

“Oui, she did. She spoke of finding the Endless Sands, whatever and wherever they are, yet she did not say what might be there.”

“Whatever it is, my lord,” said Flic, “it surely will help in the quest.”

Borel frowned. “Endless Sands . . . they’re in many a childhood tale, but I know not where they are. Do you?”

Flic shook his head. “Non.”

“What about Buzzer?”

“I’ll ask.”

After a moment, Flic said, “She has flown over sands, but they were not endless. Besides, I think that something called the Endless Sands would not have flowers abloom.”

“Well, then,” said Borel, “we’ll seek another way.”

“My lord,” said Flic, “Lady Skuld did tell you what must be done to find them: you must triumph o’er a cunning, wicked, and most deadly steed. Hmm . . . perhaps you are to slay some terrible monster.”

“I think not, Flic, else she would not have called it a steed. I think I am meant to ride it, perhaps to tame it and even ride it to those Endless Sands, wherever they are.”

“That could be,” said Flic. “Tell me: do you know how to ride?”

Borel sighed and nodded and said, “Not as well as my brother Alain, but I have spent time ahorse in saddle.”

“I think you are not likely to have a saddle on a cunning, wicked, and most deadly steed. And it might not be a horse at all, but, rather, as I said, some terrible monster, a fell beast of some sort—a Gryphon or Wyvern or even a Dragon.”

Borel took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “You might be right, Flic. But come, get Buzzer and let us be off and discover what we can in the town. It could be that someone there knows of the Endless Sands or can otherwise aid us with Lady Wyrd’s rede. As for you and me, we can ponder as we trek.”

And so, with Flic and Buzzer riding the tricorn, Borel set out along the meandering river, heading for the community lying upstream a league or two off.

As Borel strode townward, Flic said, “What about that verse she spoke. How did it go?”

Borel intoned:

“Well,” said Flic, “we’ve already journeyed far and no doubt have farther to go. And you’ve given comfort and found aid, and I am sure that will continue. And there has been hazard along the way, and, as things are going, there will likely be more. As to the blades—”

“I think Lady Wyrd was referring to the daggers surrounding the turret,” said Borel.

“Oui,” agreed Flic. “I believe she has simply verified what we suspected all along—that the daggers aren’t daggers at all but rather represent some other peril, such as terrible guardians or even an army. We won’t know what they really are until we find the turret.”

“Oui, Flic. But here is the true riddle as I see it: just why did Lady Wyrd speak the verse at all?”

“Your meaning, my lord?” asked Flic.

“Why did she utter those particular words, when all it told us was how we already act and what we already know or suspect?”

Flic frowned and shrugged a shoulder. “That is certainly a riddle, my prince, yet who can comprehend the ways of the Fates?”

 

Even as they passed dwellings on the outskirts of town, Flic said, “You know, at first I thought I should have seen that the crone was not what she seemed, and that I should have detected the glamour. But after she revealed her true self, I realized that her bewitchments would always utterly defeat my Fey sight.”

“Fey sight?” asked Borel.

“Oui. I can at times see when something is not what it seems. Oh, if the glamour is strong enough, it defies my vision. Or, if the being is powerful enough, again I am helpless to see . . . as was the case with the invisible monster in the swamp.”

“But you can see through some glamours?”

“Oh, yes. But not all. And sometimes when I do not see what I expect to be there, then I think an enchantment might be involved—either a spell so strong that my sight cannot penetrate it, or that it is truly gone. In the case of Lord Roulan’s dell, I did not see what I thought should be there, yet when you walked its length, I knew it wasn’t merely hidden. Then I thought that during the day it might be absent, but at night moonlight might make it materialize, yet I was wrong.” Flic shook his head and said, “Pah! Most of the time having Fey sight is not an advantage this way or that.”

Borel smiled and said, “I would think in the case of Lady Wyrd, she can deceive the best of
any
vision, Fey sight or no.”

Flic laughed and said, “Indeed, my lord, indeed.”

 

Using a bit of the Gnomes’ coinage, Borel took a room in the Running Stag, the best of the three inns in Riverbend, a rather modest and sleepy town. As Borel signed the register, the clerk eyed the Sprite and then the bumblebee, both of them beside Borel’s hat on the counter. The clerk turned to Borel and said, “Are you certain, Sieur, the bee is well behaved?”

As Flic huffed, Borel said, “Indeed, she is. Of course, should someone try to swat her, then she will not be bound by manners.”

“Oh, perhaps I’d better warn our other three guests as well as the staff, then.”

“I should say so,” said Flic, drawing himself up to his full naked two-inch height. “Else they’ll have to deal with me.”

“I would add,” said Borel, “that the bee is quite protective of her charge.”

“Her charge?” said the clerk.

“Me,” said Flic, grinning. “Swat me at your peril, Sieur.”

“Oh, my goodness,” said the clerk, holding out a key to Borel. “I’ll be certain to warn all.”

As Borel took the key he said, “And your baths are . . . ? —Oh, and I will need my leathers cleaned, and a robe.”

“Indeed, Sieur.”

“This, too,” said Borel. “Have you a jeweller in town, and a weapons shop? And a place where I can get a good rucksack and supplies?”

“No jeweller as such, Sieur,” said the clerk, “though there are a few brooches and rings and other like items over at the milliner’s. Jewellers, you see, arrive in the spring, peddling their wares; the milliner, she always takes extra on consignment. As for weapons, our blacksmith has a few knives and such; if he has not what you wish, he can easily make it. The dry-goods store is two streets over.”

“Ah, yes, milliner,” said Borel, looking at Flic. “Perfect, for she will have pins and needles. Which way the milliner? Blacksmith, too?”

The clerk gave directions, and then told Borel the baths at the inn were out back.

Even as Borel turned to go, a town crier stepped into the lobby and loudly called out, “Another man drowned! Another man drowned! A crofter from a stead beyond the White Rapids found floating under the red bridge by a passing goose girl.” The townsman then hurried back out to the street to herald the latest news.

“Oh, Mithras,” said the clerk, “three drownings in the last three weeks, and that’s the second one this week alone. Will those farmers never learn to respect the river?”

“Three altogether have died by drowning?” asked Borel.

“Oui, Sieur,” replied the clerk. “As I said, three in the last three weeks.”

“Has anyone investigated?”

“The constable. He went up there to the White Rapids and looked about.”

“These rapids are . . . ?”

“Terrible,” said the clerk. “They lie some two or three leagues upriver. I mean, on a quiet night, like most nights around here, you can sit on the veranda and hear them roar. They’re not anything like the rest of the Meander.”

“So the constable went up there?” said Flic.

“Oui. It was after the second death, but he found no sign of foul play.”

“Still, three in three weeks sounds somewhat suspicious,” said Borel.

The clerk shrugged. “Nevertheless, the constable, he said there just wasn’t anything to see.”

Borel frowned and looked at Flic, but the Sprite turned up both hands. He stepped onto the tricorn and said, “Let us away to the tubs.”

With Flic and Buzzer aboard, Borel took up his hat and headed for the door to the baths. Just as he reached it, the clerk called after, “Though there were quite a number of hoofprints.”

Borel turned and said, “Hoofprints?”

“Up beyond the rapids. That’s all the constable found. There’s a wild horse running amok ’round those parts that’s been destroying crops and raising havoc at night.”

Flic gasped and swung down to Borel’s shoulder and said, “Lady Wyrd knew. She knew! That’s what she meant.”

Borel nodded and intoned, “ ‘You must triumph o’er a cunning, wicked, and most deadly steed.’ ”

“A Pooka,” said Flic. “Oh, Borel, she was speaking of a Pooka. There’s a Pooka beyond the rapids, and it is drowning men.”

B
orel said, “We should go right now and—”

“Oh, no, my lord,” said Flic. “Pookas are night creatures. Besides, you don’t even have a good blade.”

“I have this one of flint,” said Borel, pulling the stone knife from his belt.

“I think you will need a better one, my lord; Pookas are quite perilous, you know . . . one of the Dark Fey . . . unseely. And so you need something better than a piece of flint to threaten him with, but not to kill him.”

“Not that I was planning to, but why not kill a Pooka?”

“If you kill a Pooka, my lord, you will be forever cursed.”

“Very well, Flic. I’ll get a long-knife at the blacksmith’s. Then we’ll go.”

“My lord prince, it is yet midmorn, hence we have most of the day for you to not only purchase a weapon, but also supplies and goods for the long journey Lady Wyrd said lies ahead of us. Hence, I think we should spend the day in town acquiring what we need. After all, we know not exactly where the creature might be, other than perhaps in the vicinity of the White Rapids. Once we get there I can fly in the night and find him.”

“All right, Flic, all right. I yield. We do have time. Let us first to the baths, and while I soak I would have you tell me all you know of Pookas. Perhaps an idea will occur on how to triumph o’er this cunning and wicked and most deadly steed.”

 

Borel gave over his leathers to the attendant for cleaning, and his linens for laundering, and then he eased his trim frame with its long, lean muscles down into the great copper tub full of hot water, where he lathered and rinsed his shoulder-length, silver-cast hair, then lathered and rinsed his body; and the silver-sheened hair on his broad chest tapered in a vee down across his flat stomach toward his narrow hips and to his groin to meet the same silvery tone, though there it was perhaps a bit darker. He then settled in to soak. As he did these things, Buzzer watched from a towel rack, while Flic sat on the side of the tub and spoke of Pookas:

“They’re also called Phookas and a number of other names, none of which are to be confused with Pwcas—a name that sounds the same, but is spelled differently—who are really Bwcas, a kind of a Goblin, but usually helpful rather than vile.