Gossamyr. Michele Hauf

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СКАЧАТЬ mortal feel like? His face was such a display of movement and lines and sighs and outburst. So emotional!

      Oblivious to Gossamyr’s curiosity, Ulrich eyed the sleeveless pourpoint, slid over the applewood sigil propped on her hip, then stretched his gaze back up her neck. Stuffed with arachnagoss and sown in a fine quilting, the garment protected from sharp or slashing weapons.

      He finally said, “Are those leaves sewn together?”

      Clutching the rugged fabric fitted snugly to her body, Gossamyr lifted her chin. “Mayhap,” she offered stubbornly, thinking a lie would be just that—so obvious. Lies served nothing but to prolong the inevitable bane. But the truth of her was a necessary misappropriation, lest she find herself in a cage rotting in a market square.

      “Leaves! Marvelous!” A brilliant smile revealed white teeth and he clapped his hands together—but the smile straightened sharply, as did his mood. “Well, I am not going with you.”

      “I did not ask your accompaniment, mort—er, Ulrich.”

      “So be off then.” He shooed her with a flip of his fingers. “Back to Faery where you belong.”

      “Do you not hear well?”

      “Perfectly.”

      “Mayhap you are daft? I said I am n-not a faery. It is ridiculous of you to assume as much.” Gossamyr crossed her arms over her chest and assumed a defiant stance.

      “What then places you here in my path, charming my mule to return at your bidding? If that is not faery glamour, I don’t know what is. Have not your kind toyed with me enough?”

      “What torments have you suffered at the hands of Faery?”

      “You don’t know?” A skip to his right, his feet nimble and sure, twirled him around once and ended with a mock bow. The man changed moods so quickly he was either barmy or a lackwit.

      He blew forcefully from his mouth, which fluttered his lips into a slobbery sound. “Is not a dance of the decades damage enough? Oh!” He thrust up his arms, then as quickly, snapped into a wary crouch and scanned the dense forest. “Am I in Faery now? If you mean me no harm then get me gone from here. I command it of you, wicked faery!”

      Gossamyr rolled her eyes at his dramatics—then narrowed her gaze on him. The remarkable thing about the man was not the bruises and blood but that contour of hair above and below his mouth. Fée men did not sport facial hair. It wasn’t necessary, for, unlike dwarves, they did not require body hair to protect from the elements. And those eyes. Blue, a color Gossamyr had never before looked into. Her mother’s brown eyes were the only anomaly from the fée violet. And her own. So much color twinned on the man’s face, and yet, that color drowned in a sea of white.

      “We stand in the mortal realm, Jean César, er—”

      “Ulrich Villon. The third—hell, what am I doing? I have just given my name complete to a faery!”

      If he only knew how little glamour she could wield with that information.

      A poke of her staff into the ground spoke her impatience. “Not a single faery taunts you this day.” Or so he must believe. But he seemed to know about her kind. And the forest, it seemed not to want him to leave her side.

      Hmm…An enchanted bane or boon? She must…test. If he could leave her, then it was mere coincidence. If he again returned to her side, then they were meant—for reasons beyond her grasp—to travel together. It is all she could figure with so little experience of this realm.

      “Get back on your mule and ride off. I will follow you over that ridge in the path to ensure your success.”

      “She is not a mule,” the man offered as he mounted. His shoes, strapped and circled in thin leather ties, grazed the grass tops. “Fancy is a rare breed, yet while lacking in height makes up for it in endurance.”

      Fancy? A miserable waste of horseflesh. But Gossamyr did not speak her annoyance. Surely the only reason for the man’s return to her twice over was that someone or thing in Faery saw to make mischief with her. But to speak to Faery—the trees, as the man would view it—would not put her to advantage. And where was the fetch when she needed to communicate?

      Gesturing the mortal and his mule follow, Gossamyr walked up the path. At the rise, she saw the forest stretched ahead for endless lengths. Not a visible root or marsh kelpie in sight. Impossible he had traveled the distance and returned to her side in so little time.

      Could Shinn be behind this? What reason had her father to place this man in her path? He had wanted her to accept a guide…

      “You are a faery,” Ulrich muttered, the mule ambling to make pace with Gossamyr’s light-footed strides. “I know it. I am not going with you, foul one.”

      “Suits me fine and well. I have no need of such misery to accompany me on my travels, you barmy bit of breath. Go. Once more,” she said as the man passed her by. And then he was gone.

      Assuming a defiant stance, shoulders back and one knee slightly bent, Gossamyr counted her breaths, waiting, wondering. A strum of her fingers across the dangling arrets produced a multitude of obsidian clicks. Deadly aim, Shinn had once remarked of her skill. She’d taken the prize in tournament three years consecutive.

      With a sigh, she shook away the sudden rise of apprehension created by her encounter with the mortal. Time threatened. Her father and his troops must battle more revenants even as she stood here.

      She felt a familiar presence first at the base of her skull, the prinkles of warning, of sure knowing.

      Gossamyr reluctantly turned to face where she had started her adventures in the Otherside. There lumbered her pisky-led mule and rider. It was too ridiculous to wonder. And so she loosed a chuckle and splayed her arms out in surrender.

      “It appears I am destined to remain at your side,” Ulrich called. “Oh, to tap into the source of such magic!” Then he narrowed his blue gaze on her and muttered, “Mayhap I will, luck be with me.”

      “I possess no magic.” And that was truth. Magic was a mortal device, forbidden in Faery. (Though there were those who dabbled.) For every use of magic, be it good or for evil, tapped Enchantment. Mortals literally stole Enchantment (most unknowing) to conjure their spells and charms and bewitchments. Should a fée be accused of dabbling, banishment was immediate.

      “I do not know why you lie, faery, but I will allow you are a lone woman who must protect herself. Of course, lies be the way of the faery.”

      “Faeries do not appeal to you?”

      “Faery circles, my lady. And we are far from—Yei-ih!” He flicked his gaze back and forth between Gossamyr and the ground. “What is that? It’s…that’s it. A toadstool circle?” Ulrich heeled the mule, but it remained stubbornly stationed beside the Passage from which Gossamyr had disembarked. “Move, beast! Get thee gone!”

      Gossamyr reached out. A tweetering whistle enticed the mule to wander toward her as she walked widdershins down the path. “They are merely toadstools. No harm will come to thee.”

      “Speaks one who has not danced!”

      A Dancer? Gossamyr peered at the mortal, seeing him newly. СКАЧАТЬ