The night was still, and undeniably beautiful. Every so often a cloud would rush overhead, pushed by southwestern breezes, but for the most part the stars shone crisp and clear, and die smell of spring was everywhere, the smell of new life.
It was a lie, Elbryan knew, all of it. The smell of new life would fast give way to the smell of goblins, powries, and giants, and the stench of death. All this serenity would be shattered under the thunderous march of the black horde, the crack of powrie whip, the rolling war engines.
It was a cruel lie: the quiet, the serenity, the spring breeze.
A movement to the side caught the wary ranger's attention, but he did not go for his weapon, recognizing the light, graceful step and the smell -- like a field of distant flowers, the gentle fragrance carried on soft breezes -- of the woman so dear to him. Pony came through the brush lightly, wearing only a soft silken nightshirt that didn't reach her knees. Her hair was down now, loose and wild, and it framed her fair face in a sensual manner, brushing her cheeks, one thick lock wrapped down and about her chin, that sent Elbryan's heart pumping.
She looked at the man and smiled, then crossed her arms to ward the breeze and turned, staring up at the night canopy.
"How could I have brought you out here?" the ranger said to her, moving up behind her and touching her gently on the shoulder.
Pony bent her head atop that hand and shifted backward, leaning against Elbryan. "How might you have stopped me?" she asked.
The ranger chuckled softly and kissed the woman's hair, wrapping his strong arms about her. How indeed? he wondered, marveling, as always, at Pony's free spirit. He could not truly love Pony, he knew, could not love who she was, if he meant to control her, for surely any attempt to harness Pony would defeat the very free spirit that Elbryan so adored. She was his in heart, but her own in will, and the ranger could not have stopped her from coming along, short of knocking her unconscious and tying her in a cave!
The woman turned within Elbryan's grasp, her soft face just below his, looking up at him.
Elbryan stared at her for a long, silent moment. An image of her lying dead at the end of a goblin spear came to him and he looked away suddenly, looked up at the stars, and wondered how he would live, what point there would be in going on with his life, if anything happened to Pony.
He felt her hand brushing against his cheek, and then the touch grew more firm as Pony turned his face back to look into her own. "We are each of us in danger," she reminded him. "And I might die, as Elbryan might die."
"Do not even utter such horrors."
"Possibilities," Pony corrected; "chances that we each took of our own volition, chances borne in duty. I would not want to live in the world that will be if the dactyl is not destroyed; rather that I had died fighting the fiend in the faraway Barbacan . . ." Her voice trailed off and she rose to her tiptoes, her lips brushing Elbryan's in a gentle kiss. "Rather that I died beside my friend, my love."
He started to look away again, unable to come to terms with that distinct possibility, but Pony's hand caught his chin firmly, forcefully, and turned him back to face her, all gentleness suddenly gone from her fair features.
"I am a warrior," the woman declared. "I have fought all of my life, since the day I wandered the road from destroyed Dundalis. I see my duty as no less than your own."
"Of course not," Elbryan quickly agreed.
"And if I am to die, then let it be in battle," Pony said through gritted teeth: "Let it be against the demon dactyl, delivering Avelyn, that the foul beast might be destroyed. I am a warrior, my love. Do not begrudge me a fitting end!"
"I would rather that your end and my own be together a hundred years hence," Elbryan replied, a helpless smile finding its way across his face.
Pony reached up to touch that smile and felt the sharp stubble of the ranger's beard, several days grown. "Ah, but my love," she said quietly, "put that fine elvish blade of yours to use on that beard, else I fear my face will glow from your scraping."
"More than your face, my love," Elbryan teased, and he lifted Pony up before him, biting her softly just under the chin, then turning his face so that his beard rubbed against her neck.
She slid back down, keeping tight to him, until their eyes met, and suddenly the play was gone from their smiles, all teasing lost in sudden intensity, in the knowledge that their time together might be nearing a very brutal end. Pony kissed him then, hard and passionately, her hands moving to grab tightly at his thick hair, to pull him even closer, though there was already no space between them.
Elbryan wrapped her even more tightly, squeezing her in his ,powerful grasp. One arm slipped down to the back of her bare leg, then up under the nightshirt, over the smooth skin of her buttocks, gently up her back, bracing her as Elbryan slowly shifted her down to the ground.
"Potion," Avelyn argued.
Bradwarden snorted. "Potion o' dizziness, then. What fool brewed such a magic as that? A drink to set ye on the ground, when a club might do a better job!"
"Potion of courage!" Avelyn protested, taking a deep swig, then wiping his forearm across his face.
"Potion o' hiding," Bradwarden said seriously, changing the tone.
Avelyn stared hard at the centaur.
"Oh, I been known to have me drinks," the centaur said. "'Tis boggle I'm favoring, and not a potion in all the world'll kick ye harder than that. But I'm drinking at times for celebrating, me friend, at the solstice and the equinox, and not for hiding."
The accusation hit. the monk hard, especially considering the source. Avelyn had grown quite close to Bradwarden over the first weeks of their journey, a bond more of respect than friendship. Now there was no mistaking the somber, accusing tone of the normally jovial centaur; Bradwarden did not approve of the monk's little flask.
"Perhaps you simply do not have as much to hide from," the monk said quietly, defiantly lifting the flask to his lips.
He didn't drink, though, not then, held back by an unrelenting stare.
"The more ye hide, the more ye need to hide," Bradwarden replied. "Ye look at me, Brother Avelyn. Ye look into me eyes to know that no lie comes from me lips."
Avelyn lowered the flask and stared hard at Bradwarden.
"Ye did no wrong in taking the stones," the centaur said.
"What foolishness is that?" the monk protested.
"Ah, but ye cannot hide from me, Avelyn Des s" Bradwarden said without hesitation, his confidence only bolstered by the monk's too loud protestation. "Ye're not afraid of yer kinfolk, not the monks, not any other Brother Justice that might come hunting ye. No, me friend, ye're afraid o' Avelyn, of what ye did and of yer eternal soul. Did ye stain it, then?"
"You know nothing."
"Ho, ho, what!" the centaur boomed in a fair imitation of Avelyn. "I know the ways o' men, the ways o' Avelyn. I know that yer drinking yer `potions o' courage' is no more than yer hiding from yer own past, from decisions ye made -- and good ones at that! Hear me now, because I would not lie to ye, I'd have no reason to lie to ye: ye did right in running, in taking the stones, even in killing the man who meant to kill yerself. Ye did what ye had to do, me friend, and so let go yer guilt, I say, and see better the road ahead. Ye said ye knew yer destiny, and I'm believing in that destiny, else I'd not have come. Ye're meant to face the dactyl, I say, to destroy the beast, and so ye will, but only if yer mind's clear, and only if yer heart's clear."
The words, coming from so mysterious, so wise, and aged a creature, hit Avelyn profoundly. He looked back at his flask and saw it for the first time as an enemy, a sign of weakness.
"Ye're not for needing yer potion," Bradwarden said. "Aye, but when ye beat the dactyl, then I'll take ye out for a bit o' boggle, and ye'll know what it means to see the world turn!" He reached out and grabbed Avelyn's wrist, pulling the flask further from the man, and locking gazes. "Avelyn needs not to hide from Avelyn," he said in all seriousness, and the monk, after a pause, nodded slowly.
"From the dactyl, now!" Bradwarden said suddenly, satisfied that he had gotten his point through. "Now, ye're wanting to hide from the dactyl until the time's right, but ye'll find yer flask a bit small for that!"
Avelyn said nothing, just nodded again. He was amazed that Bradwarden had so seen through him, had looked so clearly into his heart and soul, and had recognized the taint of guilt there. This drink that he always kept handy was no potion of courage but an admission of cowardice, a means for hiding from his own past.
Avelyn continued to stare at Bradwarden, and smiled as the centaur smiled, as the monk tossed the flask into the brush.
Now, finally, Avelyn could face his destiny with no regrets for the path that had led him to this place.
The centaur took up his pipes then and softly played, for such was the magic of Bradwarden's song that no goblin, no monster, no human, no animal even, could possibly discern its source in the forest night. His tune, mournful and hopeful all at once, calmed Avelyn and bolstered his resolve. It floated through the trees to caress the lovers, and further out to where Paulson and Chipmunk kept a watchful eye on the forest night.
And thus the group was bound by Bradwarden's song, one band, one purpose, one harmony.
The quiet night brought no such rest for Tuntun and Symphony. The elf watched the stallion closely to see if he was tiring, but the great horse ran on and on, slipping through the leafy shadows like the passage of Sheila herself, running to the horizon and beyond.
They had a quest, these two, every bit as vital to them as the hunt for the dactyl was to the seven who had left before them. For Tuntun, the sting of being left out of that all-important journey had not diminished, and no logical arguments could change the way the elf felt about it. Tuntun's stake in destroying the dactyl was no less than Juraviel's or that of any other elf or human. But it was more than that, the elf knew, and she had to admit it to herself, for it was her heart and not her mind that had forced her out here. Tuntun had to rush along, had to chase the group, in part because Belli'mar Juraviel -- her closest friend despite their constant squabbling -- was among them, but also in part because Nightbird led that troop. The elf could no longer deny her feelings for the ranger. She had played an important role in getting Elbryan to this point and, as a mother clings to her child, Tuntun could not bear to let him go off without her.
Yes, it as Nightbird more than anything else that had the sprite riding hard through the forest night. It was the man she had trained, the man she had grown to love. She trusted in the ranger -- never had she seen Elbryan's better -- but even so, she would stand beside him in this, his darkest of hours, in this, his pinnacle of glory.
The elf bent her head low over Symphony's flying mane and bade the horse to run on, and Symphony, as connected to the ranger as she, needed no encouragement and no outward guidance.
