Once in a land not too far from here and in a time not too long ago there lived a farmer and his wife. They had a peculiar daughter whom they both loved to the best of their ability. Some in the kingdom considered her a beauty, in the way some people enjoy black licorice, beets, or cilantro. A respectable line of suitors queued up. Regardless, none of these men were to her liking. Indeed, she preferred to spend her time exploring the enchanted forest after her farm chores were completed, much to her parents’ dismay.
Times were good in this kingdom, though all able bodied citizens were made to learn and keep a bow apiece should the King call upon them. People thought little of this practice. They had not seen strife in generations. Then, for reasons only the Gods know, fortunes shifted. Their grain withered. The farmer grew ill and his wife spent every waking moment tending to him until she too became ill. The King declared war on a neighboring nation. Soldiers ravaged whatever resources remained. Every farm in the kingdom as if set upon by locusts. The mother bade her daughter hide in the forest until the soldiers moved on.
Determined not to return empty handed, the farmer’s daughter ventured further than ever before in search of grouse and pheasants. Cold, callused, blistered, and glistening with stubborn tears she strung three birds together at last, practiced enough with processing chickens to field dress the fowl with minimal amenities. By then the sun was low and she had no choice but to wrap her thick wool cloak around her and settle under a tree. She dared not risk a fire.
“Why do you weep?”
“Who’s there? Show yourself!”
“Please, don’t turn around. I’m under a curse. If a maiden sets her eyes on me, I shall turn to stone.”
“What nonsense is that? Who could have such power?”
“A troll princess and her mother sought to punish me.”
“For doing what exactly?”
“I’ve hurt many maidens.”
“…are you going to hurt me?”
“You’re the one holding the bow. I’m not dangerous.” Stung.
“You just said—“
“I only bring pain to those who love me.”
“That’s not very sensible. Why’d you do such a fool thing?” She had absolutely no intention of sleeping now, but was glad of the company.
“I loved truly once. With my whole heart. I was betrayed. She wasn’t true and I didn’t…handle it well.”
“Men are sensitive.” She nodded gravely. “If indeed you are a man and not some…spirit or creature.”
“You never answered my question, Huntress. Why do you weep?”
The night passed in this fashion. This Stranger had little occasion to venture very close to farmland or roads of any sort, and as such was rather behind on current events. In fact he seemed uncertain as to what year he first settled in the enchanted forest. When dawn buffed hoary through fir needles she took her leave, promising this odd and lonely…being that she would return. Unlikely as it was that any other maidens would take up bushcraft or the hunt, she warned him off further curiosity.
Her parents’ health continued to wane long after the initial illness ran its course. With no livestock and fallow fields, survival fell to the Huntress. More and more of the kingdom’s men were called away and this was no small relief to her. They had grown restless, bawdy, and overly bold. She stayed longer and longer in the enchanted forest to compensate. There she struck up an unlikely friendship with the Stranger, speaking with surprising ease on many subjects, so alike were they in wit, intellect, and humor.
“I’ve decided, you must be a figment of my imagination.” She informed him.
“I’m as real as you are.”
“That’s just what a figment of my imagination would say.”
“Could a figment do this?” He tugged her hood down delicately.
“Maybe. You’d better watch it, or I’ll have a new lawn ornament.”
“You wouldn’t be able to carry me home.”
“Oh, so you’re a big boy then?” Her cheeks pinked as soon as the words left her mouth. “You don’t make any sound at all as you move.”
“You’re not hunting today. You’re looking for something else.” Slightly flustered. “What is it?”
“I need to make stronger medicines. My parents aren’t returning to health.”
“I could help you find the herbs you need. For a price.”
“Always words one wants to hear in an enchanted forest. What price is that?”
“Grant me three wishes.”
“If it is possible, I will grant them.” Heavy emphasis on the lead.
“…sing me a song.” He clearly had not expected to get this far.
“You asked for it.” Her voice was as divisive as her general appearance, not so much on account of her timbre alone, so much as said timbre being highly unfashionable on a woman.
“Well that’s…the most menacing rendition of Loch Lomond I’ve ever heard.” A popular tune from some unnamed bard’s epic depiction of a fictional land far away.
True to his word, the Stranger knew just where to find the herbs she sought and even some she never knew existed. In the meantime, hunger’s gaping maw gripped the kingdom. If one fared better than one’s neighbors, it was kept secret, lest a tenuous food source be extinguished in the subsequent scramble. Tensions between humans and the creatures of the enchanted forest escalated. Children who knew no better ate such fare as amanita, nightshade, and seeded yew berries. The forest was blamed.
With every excursion it seemed Stranger was slower and slower to remember himself. Distracted and forgetful. Huntress took to humming their song to call him back from wherever he went when they were apart. Finally, she reminded him with significant concern that he had two wishes remaining. This time he requested a braided lock of her hair so he might more readily recall his tether to this world. With each knot Huntress hoped to preserve her friend’s mind, that whatever curse ensnared him proved weaker than their bond. She decided long ago that it never mattered if he was real.
The war ended. At least on paper. Broken and diminished soldiers returned to a broken and diminished land. Their King decreed additional taxes on every household harboring an unmarried woman and granted exponential boons to households with children. Men lashed out and took what they thought owed them. From women. Every day and night drunk. They won! Huntress held out. Taxes or not she kept food on the table and a fire in the hearth. Suitors embittered seeing her pull it off.
Unseasonable winds groaned over faintly cresting autumn foliage. Big game best taken just ahead of breeding season, before the frenzied flush of hormones rendered their flesh unpalatable. Huntress tarried by the meeting stones. Sang louder and louder. No response from Stranger. Unable to sacrifice additional daylight, she moved on. Deeper into the woods. Many minor creatures returned in recent months, but those with magics had gone. The wrong species of mushrooms spored. Leaves dulled in color.
There in the dappled sunlight, a white 30-point buck not being as careful as he ought. This was her last hunt of the year. What she brought home today would carry her family through well into the next. She gave solemn, silent thanks and took the shot. Immediately felt as if her own heart had been struck through. She could not breathe. Where the stag fell, now lay a beautiful youth, and too little too late she saw her braid wound about his wrist. Huntress rushed to him. Checked for an injury that had disappeared.
“Why didn’t you answer me! Are you hurt? What happened? Do you know who I am?”
“Of course I know you.” Sorrow shadowed his expression. “You’ve freed me from the body of a stag by death. This isn’t how I wanted to meet you as a man.”
“What are you talking about? Why does it matter?”
“They will return. The troll princess will have her way with me.” As he spoke, grotesque demons oozed up through the leaf litter, spiky and sticky.
“How do I make it stop?”
“You can’t.” An umbilical river of hideous faces and misbegotten bones swirled upwards, carrying him off.
“I will follow you.”
“If only you could. But this kingdom is east of the sun and west of the moon and you would never find your way.” Gone.
By the time she came back to herself, night had long fallen. Lightning rent the sky and rain fell hard and straight. The only proof her dearest friend had ever been was an arthritic ache in her heart. Unnoticeable unless she moved or drew breath. So never. What transpired between forest and bed was a muted blur. As for bed, well she spent days there, which was a first. She noticed her wet linen pillowcase and realized she had been crying. Gray light washed her ever dustier room. Enough was enough.
Huntress dressed herself and prepared to leave only to find her parents had sold her hunting bow for a simple wedding gown. One of the wealthier men in town had made an offer for her hand and in their enfeebled state they were desperate for her to accept. It might have hurt, but a different kind of hurt had already taken up residence in her chest. She told them she needed to think and took to the trees again. Looked back at the carved and painted longhouse where she spent her entire life. Wondered when it had stopped feeling like home. Had it ever?
The sky cleared and the sun long set. No clues to be found where she saw him last. She thought, how will I ever find this kingdom? Because her desire was sincere, the Moon heard her and responded.
“If you travel to the great mountain of ice, there you will find a cave. You will see many horrible creatures frozen in the mountain, but they cannot hurt you. Enter the cave, and you will find in it a chamber of fire. In the fire lives the Salamander. She knows everything that is in the heart of the world. Perhaps the Salamander can help you.”
The path was straightforward, if highly unpleasant. A gruesome frieze of some long doomed battle between what could only be different factions of hell teemed either sheer wall, up high and toppled over side to side down the crevasse. Partially mutated humans captured howling as their bodies cracked open like discarded husks or cocoons. Whatever emerged a mystery. Imps making games of their tumbling entrails. Huntress felt her skin crawl and her fine hairs stand up in distinctly mammalian disgust. Bone dread.
Finally, with scarcely a sliver to pass through and heartbeat loud in her ears, Huntress entered the cave. Strange volcanic glass gleamed all around and the slightest sound echoed, reverberated, and refracted in butterfly profusion. She did her best to regain composure and tread softly to stifle further ruckus. To make a good impression on her host. Glittering stone rough as cats’ tongues sobered beneath her feet. There in the innermost chamber, Salamander’s gem pebbled form could almost be mistaken for magma flow in dusty dark purples and searing flame. Scales rumbling, grinding, melting rock somewhere further underground. The heat was unbearable.
“I do not often receive visitors.” Salamander’s nictitating membrane revealed blue green gold pools about black slit irises, not unlike mineral hot springs. “Would you mind taking tea with me? I was not blessed with thumbs.” A spread set out on an exotic rug.
“Of course.” Huntress avoided looking at her teeth and could have sworn she felt the rug giggle when she sat down. “How do you take your tea? I will serve you.”
“Surprise me. I enjoy surprises.”
A large tray bore mounds of spices and ingredients Huntress could only pray were not poison, and beside that over a carefully carved heat vent sat a great iron kettle without a handle. Salamander’s cup crafted from half the shell of a giant oyster. Her own an imp’s skull. Going off scent and color, Huntress measured out a brew fit for a Lord of the Earth. She kept a blank face as she poured from the painfully hot kettle with both hands. A small broom served as the whisk for Salamander’s cup, an ordinary whisk for her own. She lifted the shell into eager talons and waited her turn to drink.
“An unusual profile.” Nod. “Now, you have a question for me.”
“Salamander, do you know of a kingdom east of the sun and west of the moon and do you know of a youth who is to…marry a troll princess there?”
“I know what is in your heart and in the heart of the youth, and I know your hearts are breaking. But this kingdom does not lie within the fiery heart that I know. All I know of this kingdom is that it is east of the sun and west of the moon, and if you reach it you will not find a welcome within.” Took another sip and considered the dregs.
“Perhaps Father Forest can help you, for he knows everything that is in the body of the world. Rest tonight. Come morning you will find a unicorn waiting, and beside him a small tinder box. The tinder box is yours to keep, but when you have reached Father Forest, tap the unicorn three times on the left ear and he will return to me.” She flipped the cup upside down then set it aside to conclude their tea.
Salamander dove away, taking the cavern’s inhospitable temperature with her. Huntress started at the tea splatter ring. Jagged, sweeping, pooling, blackened leaves on either side reaching towards the center of some cataclysm. None of her business. Not in the habit of guessing at the future thus. One step closer towards her goal was enough.
The back pass let out high over snow capped foothills. From this vantage point she could see a mass migration in progress. Something was driving creatures of the old blood outside their natural ranges. She was sure of it now. The unicorn took them many miles with significant speed, and even with the smoothest of gaits, Huntress grew quite sore.
A vast wetland brought them to a snail’s pace. Her mount flicked his ears warily. The fog reeked in a sour, digestive sort of way. Weeping willows bent away from the delicate path as if they could not bear the sight. Shuddering sobs threaded furtively through each mass of tendrils. An entire chorus of women’s broken hearts. Mothers of bog puddles perhaps. No telling how deep any of these deathly still bodies could be.
Sniffles caused the unicorn to halt. Sniffles, and a ball in the middle of the path. On a far dry patch wept a little boy. Hiding his face. Baring his bruises. Huntress heaved a curt sigh and dismounted. Spirit tomfoolery or not there were just some things. She picked up the patchy toy reminiscent of a groundcherry, planted a little kiss hoping to make it better, and kicked the ball over to him. The sniffles stopped.
Then, a lumpy false-child consisting of root-like plant matter toddled up to her from behind. Its center a pulsing sack resembling a frog egg. It craned its head to look at her with unseeing sockets and held up a flower sprig. Night blooming jasmine.
“Ah, hello there. Thank you. That’s very…nice.” She carefully accepted the little gift and wrapped it in her kerchief.
It hugged her shins and would not let go. Huntress attempted evasive maneuvers in descending order of politeness until at last she was forced to scoop the false-child up and hurl it (gently) into the nearest pond. Not that she had first hand experience with tossing babies about. Suddenly, from giant, putrid lotus pods more and more false-children emerged, all holding various flower sprigs aloft and rushing towards her.
“Oh absolutely not.” She dodged around them but they had driven distance between her and the unicorn. “Bad bog babies! I’m going to tell your mother!”
They stopped. She hopped past them as fast as humanly possible. That is until the blood curdling wails kicked up. Once one got going, the others joined in. Louder and louder. Rancid, hissing splatter at a certain pitch. Their sacks were exploding.
“Go go go go go!” Huntress jumped onto the unicorn and they shot off.
She looked back at the little boy. Ball in hand. No face. Staring.
Never again.
Would that the remainder of their journey pass uneventful. Alas, it was not to be. What should have been the edge of a great forest had been crudely cleared by a handful of human settlers presently embroiled in direct conflict with a colony of harpies. Initially accused of stealing livestock—false, as consummate carrion connoisseurs. Later accused of stealing babies—true, as retaliation in accordance with their laws for humans cutting down their home and breaking their eggs.
Having ridden in on a unicorn—creatures revered on either side—she was summarily accepted as arbiter by both parties. Huntress shifted uncomfortably in what were apparently her Gray Traveler’s Rags of Responsibility. Well, she was raised on a farm and did frequent an enchanted forest. Schoolteacher always said the first rule of problem solving is to relax, you know more than you think you do. Numb as a bottom heavy hourglass save for the ever present knot in her heart, Huntress surveyed the premises and dutifully recorded grievances.
Investigation revealed the humans’ own guardian dogs stole the livestock and terrorized additional forest creatures. Instead of clearing painstakingly established old growth, they could graft multiple fruiting species onto an existing member of the same family and learn to partake of what the forest already offered, with respect. Several canopy trees must be planted in reparation. No more wooden houses would be built without discussing lumber with the harpies. The human children would be returned only if half of childbearing aged women lived with the colony in equinox shifts throughout the year. Only time would tell if the agreement would hold.
Having at long last reached the forest, Huntress sent the unicorn on his way and collapsed on the great roots of a towering oak tree. Sandbag snug in a good strong curve. Asleep as soon as she lay her head down. How long she slept or what she dreamed, who can say. Among her dreams she felt the forest gather all around her, stars streaking in ageless time lapse, forest floor skittering and breathing with the seasons. When she woke, she was at the heart of the forest, and the towering oak looked back at her in the full moon light. Waiting. Listening. A tree’s patience.
“Father Forest, do you know of a kingdom east of the sun and west of the moon and do you know of a youth who is to marry the troll princess there?”
A voice answered like canopy whispers and creaking branches, “I know what is in your body and in the body of the youth, and I know that your bodies call to each other. But this kingdom does not lie within the body of earth and stone that I know. All I know of this kingdom is that it lies east of the sun and west of the moon, and if you reach it you will not find a welcome within.
“Perhaps the Great Fish of the Sea can help you, for she knows everything that is in the blood of the world. Outside the forest you will find a small bow and arrow, and a goat tied to a cart. The bow and arrow are yours, but when you reach the home of the Great Fish of the Sea, tap the goat three times on his left horn and he will return to me.”
Huntress sorted and concealed her newest provisions in the grapevine-conjured wagon, hips glad for the additional rest. Cured meats, hard tack, a good length of rope, a hunting knife, and an assortment of round brightly colored treats in case she ran into more bog children. She tested the small bow without notching its single arrow. It fit nicely under her skirts. A black feather from the matron harpy tucked into her tangled hair. Everything settled she pulled her tattered hood up and closed her eyes.
Something was wrong. Of course something was wrong. No trees, no bugs, no birds, no breeze. Flat overcast sky, a dull flat field stretching as far as the eye could see in every direction, only one plant growing in it. One straight road that seemed unending. No variation at all to the goat’s rhythm. So stagnant and lukewarm the air that Huntress wondered if she still drew breath. Oppressive silence and the sensation of being watched. A strange panic welled up within her and she hummed very softly to herself to take the edge off. She even grew weary of that for the exponential energy expenditure required to maintain it. Her food smelled and tasted of nothing. Her body was far away.
Night fell. In absolute darkness she caught the scent of something that felt like sunshine blooming in her veins. Some child’s precious memory long lost. Perhaps the memory of what came before or would come after. A truth that she could find if she just got a little closer. Completeness. All she had to do was get out.
Absolutely not. Huntress pulled and set the tip of her knife against her heart. The prospect of real pain and real death prompted just enough dissonance for her to focus. She held this position until her entire body burned and her joints ached. When every muscle trembled at the static hold and her sweat chilled in a sudden breeze, she looked up again.
Foothills. Daytime. Just ahead the road collapsed into a muddy river such as not even a goat could cross and forced them to halt. Birch, walnut, maple, sycamore and other such syrup rich trees populated the other side. Surely a sight to see come autumn. The temperate climate heralded the ocean’s proximity. Downstream a bisected and bridged village. A stockade wall checkpoint blocked entry from her side. She knocked.
Minor commotion, “Who and what are ye?”
“I’m a human huntress come from a kingdom far south. I travel to meet with the Great Fish, but it seems disaster befell the road forward.”
“We befell the road forward.” A peep hole slid open. “You crossed the Nameless.”
“If that’s what you call that horrible…expanse, yes.”
“What year?”
“Year? Why it’s Year of the Cockatrice. What an odd question.” Sneaking suspicion, an icy trickle.
Hushed conversation, “It’s Year of the Sphinx.”
“…how can that be?”
More hushed conversation, “Well I don’t think you’re a demon. C’mon then. Get in here before something hitches a ride wit’ ye.”
After tossing sea salt all over herself, the goat, and the cart the guards invited her to dine in their mess hall after cleaning herself up. Nobody knew for certain how or when the Nameless formed. Prevailing lore told of a goddess coerced into bearing a cursed child. The child cried and cried and no amount of milk or sugar or shiny things ever placated him. In sleep deprived despair, run ragged for mothering him, she smothered her own baby rather than give him a name. Only gods could kill other gods. The sobering cost of doing so permanently marked the world. Or took more generations to decompose than humans could consistently recall.
Sweet Town called Council and split the Red River years back when it seemed the Nameless might spread and contaminate a major waterway. This act isolated them from the outside world but also protected that world. They accepted their fate and duty. Unfortunately controlling the second fork proved difficult and blocked ocean access they might otherwise employ to reach other villages or advance industry. Their youth grew despondent and restless.
But…Huntress had someplace, sometime, and somebody to be. A gentleman waiting so to speak. She must advance. Sweet Town called Council once more, this time to meet with their tattered gray visitor and her rather large, robust, and ornery goat. The pair would scale the mountains and wedge loose boulders down into the valley, where they could then be leveraged to form an estuary. A makeshift trolley basket system installed along the way would ferry supplies back and forth with minimal effort.
Turned out everyone was eager for something, anything to do besides drink. United around a public work where they could boast their skill and strength, the project took roughly one week. Townsfolk braided blessings and messages into the goat’s long hair, carved initials into stones, and poured libations over their freshly salmon threaded lifeline. If in some months their nannies all gave birth to uncommonly large and spirited kids, well that was none of their business.
Huntress reached an agate beached, oyster encrusted sea shelf. After tapping the goat three times on his left horn, she waded to the precipice. There, great silvery eyes glinted up at her from a fathomless seaweed forest. Rich red scales subtly patterned with iridescent mirror black and shell sheen white shivered and churned just beneath the surface.
“Great Fish of the Sea, do you know of a kingdom that is east of the sun and west of the moon and do you know of a youth who is to marry the troll princess there?”
“I know what is in your blood and in the blood of the youth, and I know that your blood yearns to flow as one. But this kingdom does not lie within the blood of salt and water which I live. All I know of this kingdom is that it lies east of the sun and west of the moon, and if you reach it you will not find a welcome within.
“Perhaps the North Wind can help you. He knows everything that is in the mind of the world. Jump on my back and I will take you there.”
They wound serpentine through ice floes, spires, and towering snow dunes traversed by massive white bears. One of whom wore a circlet. Huntress clung to the Great Fish’s dorsal spines, knowing herself a bite sized snack to any number of arctic inhabitants. Humans never set foot this far. The voracious rush of the waves a treacherous lullaby. She could not afford ease. Not that the biting cold would allow it.
The home of the North Wind jutted from the crashing sea and pierced the sky impossibly high above. A lamp-less lighthouse of sorts. Words or glyphs in a strange language inscribed on every surface. The Great Fish rose up and deposited Huntress at the bottom of the chest height steps, offering up a scale from her back before she went. Dark and brilliantly reflective. Battered, scuffed, and exhausted when she reached the door. Slammed the ring shaped knocker with both hands as hard as she could. A smaller, secret door opened and a servant led her inside.
“Is the North Wind home?” A blazing fire and fine, fat armchairs.
“No. But he will meet with you in the garden tomorrow.” Huntress wondered what manner of garden could survive here. “I’ve brought a tray from the kitchen. I’ll leave you to your rest.” The old, one-eyed warrior limped and muttered as he went about his duties, whatever those were.
Shadows played hand puppets over the engravings which covered every hard surface inside as well as out. Before sleep took her, Huntress realized the lines contained every language spoken and many never heard, or not yet born. Many far from human. Or more than human.
A fitful space between dreaming and waking. The ramblings of an overtired mind upon her.
It’s been too long. He’s forgotten you.
“Maybe. That already happened anyways.”
There won’t have been any point to this. You’ll have killed your parents for nothing.
“Not nothing. And I didn’t kill my parents.”
No? They died, destitute. Like dogs in the street. No one stepped in to care for them after you left.
“I won’t accept blame for a situation I didn’t create. I won’t marry for anything less than love.”
Love? How selfish. Such a selfish girl. How many bodies should pile up so you can attain your heart’s desire?
“All of them! Every single one! As many as it takes! Who do you think you’re speaking to?” Black and hard as permafrost.
Where is your honor? Your duty?
“Where it belongs. You could run your snotty mouth at some Kings and be of more use. How embarrassing.”
What if he doesn’t want you? What if you horrify him? What makes you any different from the troll princess?
“That’s life. I don’t lose sleep comparing myself to a troll princess. The difference is I’m the one left standing.”
…
“Is that all you’ve got? Is it?”
…
Come morning Huntress noticed the harpy feather had fallen onto her pillow in the night. Tucking the devious little thing back into her hair she ventured into the garden. The eye of a great storm swirled around the hollow tower. Her clothes whipped upwards.
“Oh, North Wind, do you know of a kingdom that east of the sun and west of the moon and do you know of a youth who is to marry the troll princess there?”
“I know what is in your mind and in the mind of the youth. I know that your mind has one purpose and his the same. I know what is in the mind of the earth and of the moon and of the sun. Yes, I know of this kingdom. It is farther than I have ever gone, but I will take you there if you will be brave, for you will not find a welcome in that place.”
The North Wind picked her up and carried her high over the earth. Devastating storms raged along their path. Harsh winter came early every land they crossed. They traveled east of the sun and west of the moon, and by the time they reached the troll kingdom the North Wind was very weak.
“Be careful in this place. Some find their way here but few ever return.”
An entire antiqued city empty and in disrepair. Huntress learned why when she passed a courtyard where the trolls had rounded all the humans up and turned them to stone. A garden of final moments. Mothers and children, lovers’ embrace, huddling, scowling defiance. Moss and lichen. Ages gone.
She entered the castle under the pretense of looking for work. The troll princess bade her clean the entire castle bottom to top. Huntress noticed but one key dangling from the princess’ waist. Trolls had little use of doors save to hoard treasure behind.
The trolls dirtied clean surfaces, pulled her hair, threw things, spat, gave mixed directions, repeatedly asked questions that inductive reasoning could have easily answered, interrogated her for supposedly impudent tone, threw massive tantrums over the slightest inconvenience, piled extra tasks upon her then complained when they slowed her down. Huntress observed their petty obsession with rank and took the opportunity to sow discord so they would argue with each other instead of pester her. During a particularly vile taunting session she managed to lift the key off the princess, pretending to slip on her own filthy mop water. The troll princess raged and went to change.
On the top floor a locked door. Behind it a room full of gold and gems. Floor to ceiling. An eerily glowing chalice in the corner on a pedestal. Huntress prickled with irritation. Just a bunch of junk good people toiled and died for, all of it in her way. Tucked in the very back behind soiled tapestries she found Stranger frozen solid in a block of enchanted ice. The sight of him after so long apart strummed a slow, sweet, and heavy ache in her heart.
The needfire lit with her tinder box melted the ice away and returned color to Stranger’s skin. He woke frail and disoriented, there and not, shadowed but still beautiful.
“I had the strangest dream. My life was a room I couldn’t enter. Everywhere I’d gone but they’ve all come back now.” He was not looking at her. “Were they trying to find you?”
“That’s nice beloved, we’re in a troll castle. Can you stand or must I carry you?” She firmly but gently stood him up and shouldered his torso.
“I know that smell.” Slowly coming into focus, blessedly in a compliant daze.
“Here, you hold onto this.” Huntress took the somehow still blooming and fragrant jasmine gifted by the bog baby and tucked it into his hair. “And hold onto this.” Put his hands onto the waist rope now linking them just like a toddler leash at a festival. “We’re going to play a game okay?”
“Okay…” Peering around aimlessly prattling about this and that in a way that she found intensely endearing, gods help her.
The needfire burned so hot and bright that gold bled into stone. She took a torch and methodically set every flammable object ablaze on their way out. Stranger instinctively remained in her general proximity, something not even the severe temporal distortion of the enchantment could break him of. When trolls frantically rushed to check on their hoard she ducked them into an alcove and popped a sticky candy into Stranger’s willing mouth to temporarily silence him.
Shrieks and screams as the fire jumped from body to body at the slightest provocation. Dodged their way to the stairs but sighted by a straggler. Huntress had a hand full of blessed salt to its throat before it could notify the others. Futile struggle. Convulsed as its flesh withered through, hissing. Dropped to the ground.
Wrinkling at the scent of burnt troll, Stranger buried his nose in her hair instead. Getting warmer then. A good sign. Unexpected cross breeze on the second floor. A bad sign for the trolls there. Dislodging the harpy feather, Huntress drew it across her lips and inhaled. They never even saw what stole their breath away. Dead in seconds.
Bow out rounding on the bottom floor. The troll princess shouted orders having finally sensed something amiss.
“Not as stupid as you look then!” Stealth mode off, bow hidden behind the line of her figure.
The princess screamed and charged, ax risen to cleave the interloper in twain. Shot through the heart for her trouble. Her corpse turned wooden and rooted in place. Grabbing the fallen ax with both hands Huntress swung a circle, careful of Stranger whom she had laced fingers and ankle swept gracefully to the floor, and launched it into the troll mother’s jugular. Sun high enough to pour through the windows. The mirror scale made short work of the remaining trolls, petrifying them as they attempted to get around the two corpse chokepoint.
Once Stranger crossed the threshold, the castle began to crumble, the third floor still in flames. Clear of the rubble and quake. Panting.
“It’s you. You came for me.” Paying full attention now.
“Who did you think you were talking to this whole time?”
“Well…I always talk to you. Ever since we met.”
Her ears felt hot, and rather than respond immediately she tried to rub some ashes off his cheek and only succeeded in smearing them, “You have one wish remaining.” The more mussed his appearance the more feral her pulse.
“I believe your exact words were, if it is possible.” Stranger reached out to thumb blood off her own cheek.
“Anything is possible, as long as you keep looking at me like that.”
Sparrows picked curiously at the courtyard statues, chipping away to reveal living skin.
The people celebrated their freedom in the aftermath. A great hearth rose stone by stone to contain the mighty needfire. Trolls, melted treasure and all. The great migration gathered there and a blended forest city rose about it. Huntress and Stranger were wreathed Lord and Lady of that land, and killing any white stag expressly forbidden as a highly unlucky act.
From that day onward, if any traveler on the open road asked the way to a kingdom that lay east of the sun and west of the moon, people would answer, “The way to that kingdom is hard, but if you reach it, you will find a welcome within.”
Notes: Key phrases and basic structure from East of the Sun & West of the Moon by Mercer Mayer.
wyrdwind 