Gossamyr Part 17

He could be right. She may need him. She may not. Right now the alicorn needed her. Since she was headed the Red Lady's direction anyway...

"So we continue on together?"

"I'd say I was delighted," Ulrich said, "but for some reason I can only feel foreboding. Onward then. Mayhem awaits."

TEN.

Paris looked a pincus.h.i.+on for the fleched stone church spires piercing the gray afternoon. Dozens of windmills dotted the periphery outside the stone ramparts, the creak of sun-dried wood competing with the chirp of hidden crickets. Not a frog song to be heard; Gossamyr missed the evening concerts. What a perfect ending to a day to find oneself dangling upside down, knees hooked over a root, and whistling to the tune of a frog symphony.

A strange croaky rumble, unfamiliar to Gossamyr, wavered somewhere off by the stream. That be not a frog.

A fine mist fell upon her head, raindrops bejeweling the interlocked ropes of her plaited tresses. Fancy's mane, dressed in round droplets, rendered the beast Enchanted. A storm brewed in the heady miasma crowding her nostrils. Gossamyr could not judge when it would fall. She had not learned to portend the weather. But here in the Otherside the heavy future of rain tingled her to an antic.i.p.atory expectation. So familiar this air. Yet she had not skipped since yestereve. Far too occupied by threats. And happy to do so.

The click of a wood beetle brought her to alert.

Standing upon a hill, Gossamyr observed the distant crowd hovering about the gates to the city. Not a quiet bunch. Shouts of declaration and good-natured tussle spiked the sky. Eyes, some alert, most tired, darted here and there. Mules broke rein and kicked up the dirt. Children wailed from their aching bellies, and dogs barked at everything that moved.

"We must be cautious," Ulrich said. He waited at Fancy's side for Gossamyr to venture onward. "The Armagnacs stalk travelers to the city."

That curious word again. "You said they were Frenchmen? Be they enemy or ally?"

"I'd like to call them enemy but they appear to side with our dethroned king. Yet they kill their own to gain control over the Burgundians."

"And what is a Burgundian?"

"Northerners; vulgar, stupid beasts-Frenchmen, as well. And then there are the English-" he reached around behind his thigh and waggled a finger in display "-drunks with tails, they are. h.e.l.l, this war is a farce. Methinks it is every man for himself. A woman must be most cautious."

"I will be."

"Your pretty stick will serve little against a gang of bloodthirsty Frenchmen. Best to now consider every man our enemy. These are impossible times." He scanned the horizon. "But you mustn't judge by what you have seen. There is goodness. Somewhere, surely."

"Yes, in the eyes of a child," she answered rotely. For she remembered yet the dirty grin of the village child who had smiled upon her earlier.

"Come." Ulrich slapped Fancy's flank to stir the mule to a walk. "We will stop at the water mill at the base of the hill before moving to the gates. See there, a convoy of carts approaches. Likely they carry provisions such as flour and weapons-open game to marauders. Be on your guard."

"I will."

The decimated water mill had seen better days. Planks had been torn from the wall frame, rendering it a skeleton with a ma.s.sive grindstone for a heart. The water wheel looked to be lodged in hardened mud. Faint scent of milled flour hung in the air, and the surrounding trampled gra.s.s was matted with gray powder. View of the Porte St. Jacques was sheltered by a line of stacked hay piled so high Gossamyr guessed a spry goat must have laid the last bits to the top.

"Refreshment?" Ulrich winked at Gossamyr and tramped around behind the mill.

A crystal stream but four strides in width beckoned both travelers and their mule. Marching ahead, Ulrich noted the fetch, which fluttered overhead. It dodged and swooped, teasing the last rays of sun with iridescent wings. "That dragonfly is huge!"

"It is my father's fetch."

He followed the fetch's flight, hand to his eyes to block the sun. "A means to keep an eye on you?"

"Indeed. You mustn't heed it. It comes and goes as needed."

"So long as it has no intention of attacking."

"Worry not. The fetch is merely an instrument."

Squatting near the ma.s.sive wood wheel that once moved with the water to grind flour, Ulrich cupped water to drink and splashed his face and hair, though his eyes took in the surroundings, ever vigilant. Content, he swiped the moisture from his chin and smiled over at Gossamyr. The road dust and grime had been washed from his face. 'Twas the first time she had seen him looking so clean.

Keeping her own vigilant scan of their surroundings, Gossamyr p.r.i.c.ked her ears, but could not hear any brigands who waited before the gate to Paris. a.s.suming such an attack would first stir a warning noise, Gossamyr relaxed.

Kneeling to stir her fingers in the cool water, she cupped a few palmfuls to drink. Sweet, finer than honey wine.

"So what-" A croak like she had heard previous would not go unnoticed. Gossamyr turned her head to seek the noise. "What, by an elf's twelve toes, is that horrible noise?"

"Frogs." Ulrich leaned back and spewed out a spray of water, misting their heads.

"Frogs?" Gossamyr searched the sky and the darkening shadows of a nearby apple tree for a fat amphibian. "Where?"

"Why do you look up there?"

"I cannot see a frog." She made a shape with her hands to demonstrate the girth of the creature. "They are usually big enough to spy."

With a laughing grin, Ulrich said, "I know naught what manner of frog accustoms your dreams, fair lady-ah, so frogs are unique in Faery?"

"Not really. They are usual. About this big." She caressed the air in a circle about the size of her head. "They usually fly during the night. But their song is more melodious than that bleating racket."

"Frogs do not fly. Trust me."

"They do."

"Do." Ulrich bat an admonis.h.i.+ng finger at her. "Not."

"Where are you off to?"

Cape abandoned in a lump, Ulrich wandered to and fro along the stream, his head down and searching. Skinny legs blocked by brilliant green stripes bent and twisted. A comical sight, his dance at stream's edge. After a few moments he returned and squatted before Gossamyr.

"That-" he placed a small slimy creature in her cupped palms "-be a frog."

Gossamyr tilted the brown, warty creature this way and that. Slime-glossed eyes filmed over. Its viscous body heaved in breaths. And the smell, like dirt, was the furthest from the sweet scent Faery frogs emitted.

She held the creature out on her splayed palm. "Looks like a toad to me."

A heavy sigh preceded Ulrich's inspection of the amphibian. His eyes crossing as he peered closely, he smirked and gave a defeated nod. "So it is."

Smiling not too large, Gossamyr set the toad on the gra.s.s at water's edge.

"So Faery frogs be so big as a man's head?"

"And winged. They make excellent leathers."

"Don't tell me. Your braies?"

She slid a palm along the still-intact leather braies. "They are thin and soft but strong."

"And violet. I suppose they are not dyed, but the actual color of the beast?"

"Do you find that strange?"

"As a mortal, yes, I find that most unusual."

"Then I suppose wee frogs may seem even more strange. They are a deep violet with yellow toes."

"Wee frogs?"

"Yes. Nasty bit of wings. They've a tendency to fly up a fee's nose should they be unfortunate enough to stumble into a pod flying head level."

"Up one's- I don't even want to know. I can only be thankful the time I spent in Faery was brief. And yet...here in my own world..." He clammed up quickly. Too quickly.

Thinking of his lost years, Gossamyr guessed. Time had stolen an entire chunk of his life-because of her own. She should be thankful he had not attempted malice against her in retaliation. He had every right. Twenty years stolen was hardly fitting punishment for but an afternoon of dance.

Bowing her head and wincing at the horrible creaking frog song, Gossamyr studied the sh.o.r.e stones, smoothened and slick. Her thoughts skipped over to the mule's saddlebag. Just her luck she had taken as her partner on this journey the one man who roamed the earth with a contraband alicorn in hand. She could hardly cut him loose to wander about on his own, most likely, to fall victim to evil.

But she could not simply take the alicorn from him. He was the rightful owner. Should she touch the sacred object, well-she wasn't sure what would happen.

It was a wonder the man had gotten this far with it. Only the pure of heart could actually handle the alicorn without protection. Remarkable, merely wrapping it in cloth s.h.i.+elded it from harm. And to even approach the unicorn to return it? Should not the man be an innocent? Pure and strong of heart. A virginal maiden or a valorous knight-those were but the choices.

What of a champion?

Gossamyr lifted a brow. She had yet to do anything worthy. Fighting off beasties had merely proven distraction. But soon. Somewhere in Paris the Red Lady lurked.

Now, to keep Ulrich and his prize safe from the succubus.

"It would fetch a mighty fortune."

Gossamyr looked to Ulrich, who now stood over her, shadowing her troubled silence.

He nodded toward the mule and the tattered leather saddlebag. "You're thinking about it, I know."

"Is mind reading another of your skills?"

"Not at all."

"Obviously, because you are wrong. I should never barter a sacred object."

He squatted beside her. Suddenly aware of the man's size, Gossamyr took him in on the sly. Wider and more muscled than she, he smelled sweet from the stream and a fresh scrubbing. Earthy, as she had before noticed. And...hmm, what else made her close her eyes and sniff the air? Almost as if to breathe him in. To put him into her senses like a new flower she wanted to memorize and catalog under the heading "favorable."

'Twas not a sensual attraction-but certainly she wanted to know this man. Mortal, so grounded. A man like one of those Armagnacs who would kill their own? Far from it. Jean Cesar Ulrich Villon III somehow gentled her uncertainties. How, she could not determine. He be not a man of fine words or chivalrous actions. He cursed her and complained endlessly. Mayhap it was simply because he accepted her and treated her as an equal.

Mayhap they two were more alike in ways she had yet to learn.

Ulrich toyed with the thick gra.s.s tops. A cast of his gaze over the horizon snagged sun glints in his eyes. "What is it like to leave a place that must be truly magical and come to this...mortal h.e.l.l?"

Gossamyr shook out of her reverie. "Faery is not magical."

"It is to a person who can only imagine it."

"Magic does not exist in Faery. Magic is evil."

"You say so?"

His curiosity fixed sparkling blue eyes to her. What they searched for on her face Gossamyr could not know. But he looked, and took great leisure in doing so.

"For every act of magic practiced on the Otherside," she said, "a bit of Enchantment is sluiced away through the rift. It is outlawed."

"Really? Yet, it is quite common in my world."

"Oh, of that we are aware. Magic be a mortal device, yet it cannot exist without Enchantment. Every act of magic, be it good or for evil, is felt by Faery. Makes me wonder if the fine lady in the caravan practiced. To wield such control over one of my kind?"

"But if the caged faery was disenchanted?"

"Yes, but one touch from a mortal has made her weaker."

"Merely by a mortal's touch?" Ulrich rubbed his palms together and peered over his paired hands at her. "I have touched you."

"Yes."

"Am I...making you weak?"

"No. In fact, I feel no chill when you touch me. That is what happens when a fee is mortal touched."

"I see. What do you feel?"

"Splendid," Gossamyr said. She clapped her mouth shut. The man c.o.c.ked a brow at her. "I didn't mean to say that."

"Oh no?"

"No, I...blight." She had meant to say such. This conversation tread an intimacy that made her uncertain. "This Otherside is..." She splayed out a hand. "Different from my expectations. Not so vibrant. And dirty and slow. The sky here is sluiced with dull and the gra.s.s and trees are but a shade of the vibrance of Faery."

"But it makes you dance."

"Yes. I feel light. There are children in abundance here."

"Not so in Faery?"