Damsel Knight (9 page)

Gelert, she thinks. Gelert came to save them. Only, when she manages to raise her head from the dirt it's not Gelert she sees.

A woman stands over them, a black cloak pulled over a face as well-worn as old leather. Her back is crooked, and the hair peeking out from under the cloak is white as bone. She glances down at them with one pale eye, the other nothing but a dark hole in the side of her head. Her mouth gapes open, lips loose around naked gums.

Flames every colour of the rainbow streak from a waist high wooden staff, spreading across the sky in waves. A witch.

Chapter 10

"Drink up my dear," the witch says, with a gummy smile. "It's only milk and honey, but it should bring back some warmth to your bones."

Bonnie looks down at her cup; a tiny delicate thing made of wood and carved with prancing kittens. She glances back up at the witch with mistrust. The witch said her name was Claudia and to call her that, but it doesn't fit her, like her house doesn't fit her.

Witches are synonymous with black magic. Everyone knows that. It takes special training, and a certain kind of person to wield magic wisely and become a druid. They start their training before ten summers of age, and are older than herself and Neven when they are allowed to perform the simplest of spells. The uneducated witches are dangerous to everyone they come across.

Magic has a price, and if you don't know how to pay that price correctly, it takes. Sometimes it's only the witch that suffers, but often magic will take from those around them as well. Crops suffer, children are stricken with sudden disease, whole flocks of animals die without cause.

Witches are evil. They feed off the people around them to get the things they want. Little more than parasites, Jack always said. They featured a lot in his puppet shows, sacrificing other's animals for beauty, even their own children for youth. They form pacts with dark spirits to kill people, and poison cities for fun.

This house doesn't look like it's owned by someone who talks with dark spirits. It's a roundhouse in shape, but the walls are made from carved wood instead of wattle and daub. A stone hearth burns in the middle of the room, and opposite the door, the cabinet stands packed with some of the smaller carvings.

Every surface, and most of the walls are covered with knitted wool of some description, giving it a cosy feel. You can't look in any direction without seeing a carving standing on the dirt floor or jutting out of a wall. Even the table they're sitting around is held up by a strange, but happy looking creature with huge ears and a long wooden nose.

"An elephant," the witch says, seeing her looking. Having no teeth slurs her speech, but Bonnie soon finds her ears adjusting to it. "My King thought them magic, until he managed to procure one from the Romans to study. A creature of flesh and blood like you or I, but no less magnificent don't you think?"

"The King doesn't trade with anyone outside the circle," Neven says. He'd been near frozen through after they finally gave up the search for Alice to find warmth. His skin still veers too much toward blue, but now he's sipping his milk his eyes are more focused.

Bonnie takes that as a good sign and takes a sip of hers. It tastes sweet and warm, the heat settling comfortably in her stomach.

"This King doesn't. A folly that will cost him. No man can achieve great things without help, and no country can achieve greatness without looking to others for ideas." She takes a long drink from her carved cup, decorated with songbirds. "No child, it wasn't your King I was speaking of, it was mine. King Goron, father of this King Robin before a dragon slew him. King Goron was a different kind of King. Courageous. We invaded more countries than I can count, and every one bended their knee to us. He knew more of magic than anyone who came before him, and after him I would think."

Neven's mouth gapes open and closed. Bonnie feels the same way. "King Goron died one thousand years ago."

Claudia chuckles into her cup. "And you're surprised at little old me for living that long, but not King Robin for looking much better than I do after these long centuries. Or King Goron. No one's sure about his age, but everyone agrees he had at least five centuries before he met his end."

Neven splutters, then stays silent, obviously not wanting to offend her. Bonnie has no such qualms.

"You're a witch," she says bluntly. "Trained druids help the King stay youthful. Witches have no such training."

Claudia's one dark eye dances with humour. "And what makes you children so sure I'm not a druid?"

"Only highborn males are chosen to become druids," Neven says quickly, before ducking his head to analyse the carvings on his cup, and avoid that peering eye. "You're no male."

"I was trained by my King's chief druid herself. Also a woman. My mother" Her toothless smile becomes mischievous. "He believed that in some ways women made stronger druids than men. So he bought several women slaves and taught them his magic. That was a kindness, but also a cruelty. You see, your strength at magic depends on understanding the way the world works, concentration, knowing the price for the spell, and how much you love what you give up. Every time one of his druids bore a babe, they would give it up. I never saw what happened to them, but my mother thanked her King every day for allowing her to keep me. And once I bore my own son, I thanked the ancestors every day when my King died before he could make me give him up. I loved my King, but I loved my son more."

Neven chews his lip. "So you could be a druid even if you aren't a highborn male?"

“Child, let me give you some advice,” Claudia swirls her cup before downing the rest of the contents. “The world is going to tell you what you can’t do all your life. Never make it easy for them. Choose a dream and work your fingers to the bone making it come true. I won’t lie and say it’ll happen, but I can say with certainty that if you don’t try it will definitely never happen. So try, and maybe you’ll be one of the lucky ones. Luck loves those that try, and hates those that don’t.”

The words cause Bonnie’s thoughts to whirl back to Alice. Alice out there in the dark with those things. If her own dream is ever to come true then she needs Alice. Her chances of becoming a knight like her father begin and end with her. She swallows the rest of the milk, then pushes herself to her feet. “We’ve warmed up. We need to look for our friend again.”

Claudia shakes her head sadly. “The lost ones are still out there, and I fear I’m running out of staff to chase them off.” She raises the stick of carved wood. It’s half the size it was, now a little over the length of her forearm. The end is charred. “I’ve been carving a new one, but it’ll take a few more weeks to finish. The longer you labour over these things, the more you come to love them, and the stronger the magic you can use them for. My staffs do not last so long these days. The life of a druid is a hard one. The heart can only lose so much before starts to wonder if a life without love would be an easier one.”

“What are those things?” Neven asks, shivering from under the heavy woollen blanket Claudia had wrapped around his shoulders. “Will they hurt her?”

“They don’t intend to,” Claudia shuffles her crooked form around the table, gathering up the cups. She pauses to fuss with Neven’s blanket, tucking it around him tight. “The lost ones are not evil, though doubtless many think of them that way. They were once people like you and me. They fled the wrath of King Robin. Many did in the years of the purge. They met their sad ends. Most times the ancestors gather up souls, and bring them through the water to the other world. But when a soul clings to life, perhaps caught in suffering, it gets lost and can’t find the way. They forget everything that they are, except that they knew life once, and it was glorious compared to their cold, emotionless existence. They are shy, sweet creatures.”

Neven snorts, his expression sour. “They tricked us. They pretended to be a friend of mine. They lured Alice away from us.”

“They’ve forgotten everything they are. Yet when they meet someone they’re little small children, excited to communicate.” Claudia busies herself around the room, pulling a bowl of what looks like honey cake from one of the wooden cupboards. “But you need to know who you are to communicate, so they reach into the person’s mind and take the form of the one closest to the surface of their thoughts. They’ll try to get you alone so they can connect with you. Every human dead or alive desires connection with another. But sooner or later their excitement overcomes their shyness and they touch you, wrapping themselves around you and tasting your life. As you can see, it doesn’t end well for their new friends.”

“Which is why we need to be out there,” Bonnie says as firmly as she can manage. For most women that would be enough, but Claudia isn’t most women. A couple of boys aren’t going to intimidate an old witch this far away from King Robin’s rule. “Alice is important. She’s-” she breaks off, thinking how to best explain why they need her without mentioning the dragon. Even a witch might mistrust anyone travelling with a dragon. The lost ones might kill, but they’d do so without intending to harm. Dragons live for nothing but killing. What is evil, if not a creature like that? “She’s our friend, and it’s not safe. She doesn’t know how to protect herself. She’ll be scared. You know these woods. Help us.”

“I’ll take another look if it will calm you child,” Claudia says with a sigh. She places the honey cake in the middle of the table, serving them each up a slice without asking. “But you two stay here, eat and sleep. I sleep in my armchair more often than not these days, so you two use the bed. And don’t argue with me child, by the gods you’re a stubborn one. The lost ones will stay away from me with a short warning, but you’ll lure them like flies to honey. The both of you stink of life.”

Bonnie frowns, shifting where she stands to better feel the comforting weight of the sword on her back. “We can’t just stay here and do nothing.”

“Staying is exactly what you’ll do,” Claudia wraps a shawl around herself, her expression fierce. “My house is the only one for miles. The only one in the whole forest for all I know. If this princess of yours goes anywhere, she’ll be following the smoke from my chimney to here. So stay, wrap yourselves up warm, and perhaps she’ll be here before I get back. Don’t be alarmed if you feel a chill. The lost ones often wander close, but they won’t come in as long as the fire’s burning. They don’t like the light. It makes them remember.”

Neven opens his mouth to argue. Thinking quickly, Bonnie gets there first. She sits in front of her cake, forcing what she hopes looks like a polite nod. “Thank you for all your help. We’re both really grateful.”

Neven turns to stare at her for a beat too long, then he turns back to the woman. “Yes. Really grateful.”

Neven twitches impatiently in his chair until Claudia shuffles out the door, a blue glow trailing off the end of her staff like smoke. She gives them a measured look before she closes the oval door, as if trying to tell whether they meant to listen to her instruction and stay put.

She doesn’t need to worry. Bonnie isn’t going to brave the lost ones without magic. Her bones are still frozen through from last time, and she’s starting to think it won’t come to any good.

“What was that?” Neven hisses once the door clicks shut. “I know you don’t like Alice, but we can’t leave her out there.”

Bonnie pushes away her honey cake. She hasn’t had cake since the previous summer when Jack visited Porthdon with his puppets and bought some for her, but right now she has no hunger. “She called Alice a princess.”

“So?” Neven wrinkles his nose in confusion. “She is a princess.”

“How does she know that Neven?” Bonnie shrugs the half charred shield off her shoulder in frustration. It clunks to the dirt floor and rattles against carved wood of her chair. “Neither of us mentioned that, so how does she know?”

***

Bonnie crawls out from under the pile of blankets, rubbing her eyes. She hadn’t meant to sleep. They were still cold from their encounter with the lost ones, so when a chill stole over the house it seemed natural to wait it out under some blankets on Claudia’s straw filled bed. All that dragon slaying and walking the previous day must have taken it out of her, because morning greets her blinking eyes. Neven and the witch sit side by side at the round table, pouring over a dusty looking book.

Something uneasy crawls under her skin. They look entirely too friendly for comfort. She digs in the woollen blankets before she finds her father’s sword, still securely in its scabbard and harness. The charred shield leans against the bed. She feels better once both are in her rightful places on her back and shoulder. Then a horrible thought occurs to her, leaving her twice as wary as before. What good can a sword do against magic?

“Come over here dear. Next to the fire,” Claudia says, that one eye fixing on her. “I’ve prepared breakfast. A simple fare given freely by the forest. Egg, roast bird, some greens. Sit, eat. You’ve had quite the journey from what your friend has been telling me.”

Bonnie turns sharply to Neven, trying to keep her emotions off her face.

“Yes,” Neven says quickly. He twiddles his fingers on the carved table, but manages not to blush. “It was silly of us. We just wanted to see the dragon island with our friend Jack, but we got distracted playing and when we got back the boat was gone. We knew another boat wouldn't come for weeks, so we had no choice except to try and cross the forest."

"You might have been better off waiting. This forest is not one to enter lightly, and it's certainly no place for children." Claudia smiles a toothless smile at Bonnie, and pats the empty place next to her.

Bonnie has no choice but to sit. She does so carefully, adjusting her sword and dropping her shield by the legs of her chair. Her father wouldn't have approved of that. Wearing weapons at the breakfast table isn't what you'd call polite, and as good as he'd been with a sword, his ability to charm was just as polished. Though some took offence to his tendency to talk directly to women instead of through their husbands, she'd rarely seen one of his conversations last longer than two minutes without a smile or laugh from the other party.