The War of Odds (11 page)

They walked up to where the teens sat on the ground. The girls struggled to their feet with Nate’s help. “Muriel, thank you so much, I don’t know… what would have happened,” tears welled up in Sara’s eyes again as she remembered the hideous fire of the Zxither’s venom.

Chloe, still pale and weak from her intimate encounter with death, added, “Yes, thank you, Muriel.”

Muriel’s hard shell of anger and resentment toward human beings melted at the girl’s vulnerability and heart-felt courtesy. She smiled, “Actually Sara, you did very well against a formidable foe. Now,” she paused and took a decisive breath, “it’s time for you three to prepare for our journey into the underworld and the faery lands of Timeron, the king. Go back to your tents, eat, and pack your bags. Most of all, you need to rest. We will leave at first light.”

The teens stared at her with their mouths open in shock, and Muriel shouted, “GO!”

Nate gave his friends a final embrace and left to go to his tent with the dwarves. Sara and Chloe turned away and walked to their tent. Both girls were so tired and frightened over what happened earlier, they hardly cared to eat dinner, but Pollo begged them to come out and partake of a meal his ma had made especially for the departing army.

Groaning, the girls walked through the sprite’s village to where a large bonfire blazed merrily, and the sprites sang songs of courage and victory. They saw that there were many special treats offered at this evenings feast; trout stew and vegetable pastries, turnip greens and roasted apples, berry cobblers, ale and wine. At each table Sara and Chloe visited for a sample of food, the sprites, dwarves, pixies and elves wished them well.
 
“Good luck, my lady!” they heard, and “Be strong, brave humans!”

“Sara… Chloe, over here!” Nate shouted and the girls made their way through the throng. Sitting down, Sara noticed that many strange creatures were arriving at the celebration and farewell party. There were small, misshapen gnomes, and large, stony giants, pixies, sylphs and timid unicorns. Primrose Faeries hid behind their petal robes and hobs studied the feast food carefully and offered advice.

Water Fay bobbed in the rivers chilly water, and emissaries of the Frog queen paid homage to the departing army. Sara blinked back tears of awe and gratitude at the trust these otherworldly creatures were placing in her ability to heal the fairy king. She cast her eyes down in apprehension. After what happened earlier this evening, Sara was not at all positive that she had what it took to accomplish the mission.

Then a tall, painfully thin man walked into the fire’s light. He was very, very old with silver hair tied back in a queue and a shabby brown cloak. The teens stared at him in surprise. First, he looked human, and second, every creature there gasped in shock at the man’s arrival. A low smattering of applause, turned into a roar of joy and thunderous applause.

The man smiled, and pulled a violin out from under his cloak. He lifted his hands, gesturing for silence, and took a seat on a large, fallen log. It took a few moments, but finally the boisterous applause died down and he spoke into the silence.

“My name is William Smithers, although most of you know me as, The Brown Man. I was born into the land of men, but by foolish good luck, I fell into the land of Faery many, many years ago… more years than I care to contemplate” He smiled, gazing at the teenagers, most especially at the healer, Sara.

“I heard about your plans, and traveled as quickly as I could to offer my assistance… if you will have me.” More cheers erupted, and the sprite king thundered, “Silence! Let the man speak, for pity’s sake.” Turning to William, Sylvan bowed low and squeaked, “We are honored by your generosity, minstrel. Thank you!”

William bowed his head, and then said, “I will sing you a song, but before I begin, I have news to tell, of this world and the world of man…” The expression on the old man’s face was so sad, so grave the creatures in attendance held their breath in dread.

“Earthquakes and tempests rock the human lands, although, so far, your family members remain safe.” William spoke directly to the human teens.

Sara heaved a sigh of relief and turned to hear the rest of William’s news. “The story here is not so benign, however.” He turned to Sylvan and Muriel, the wood nymph. “All of fae suffers under the blight of darkness now. Foul creatures walk the land and whole forests die under killing frosts. Many species now flee to safety, and I strongly urge those of you who do not go on this quest with us to do the same. We are all in grave danger!”

With those words, he lifted his violin, tucked it comfortably under his chin and started to play a song…

We sing tonight,

a song of strength and courage.

We dance tonight and raise our glasses high

We dream tonight our

hopes and plans will flourish

We say goodbye and raise our glasses high

The night is dark

our spirits quake and wail, but

the stakes are high- we know we must prevail

So sing tonight,

our song of war and courage

and dance tonight,

and raise your glasses high!

Chapter 12

Sara grumbled sleepily when a rough hand shook her awake the next morning. “Sara, get up, it’s time to go,” Muriel stood by the edge of her pallet with a wooden candle lantern in her hand. It was still dark, but Sara heard the sounds of activity outside and her heart skipped a beat. Their mission to go deep into the underworld of Timaron’s Unseelie court was beginning, and she was frightened.

“Okay, Muriel,” she said softly, “Just give me a minute to get dressed.”

Muriel gazed down at the disheveled girl for a moment, and knew that the fae asked too much of her. The nymph had never gone into the underworld realms, and she felt a fear just as keen as Sara’s was. Nymphs are, by nature, elemental creatures of the earthly realm- of trees and leaves, mulch and berries, the damp and warm glimmering sunlight of forests and streams.

Faeries of the underworld, however, are not attached to any one realm but all of them simultaneously, and do not show a particular loyalty or allegiance to any one world. These faeries are either air spirits, or spirits of fire. Air faeries are usually benign and are known to travel restlessly between realms. Depending on their mood, air faeries might bestow gifts… like a cool breeze on a hot summer day, or wreak havoc on the earthly plane by joining forces with the water fae, which often results in monsoons or hurricanes. Air fae are necessary for all of the planet’s realms, but capricious and fickle.

The worst collaboration, in Muriel’s experience, was when air faeries joined forces with the fire fae. The resulting collusion often turned small blazes into roaring infernos, turned healthy forests into charred ruins, and cost untold lives; human, animal and fae. Worse, demons often rode on the backs of fire elementals. When that happened, the foul humors of darkness and evil followed in their wake, infecting every living thing with sorrow, despair, and bad intentions.

Muriel shuddered, thinking-
that is where we go now, to the realm of darkness, pain and sorrow.
 
For a moment, the old witch despaired… she was as out of place in the underworld as a fish in the sky, or a bird in the ocean.

Then, her normal cantankerous nature took over. She barked, “I want to see the two of you standing by the fire and ready to go in twenty paces!” and stepped outside of the tent.

Sara had tried, once, to explain the concepts of time, and human means of measuring it, but the nymph dismissed the girl’s explanations with a sniff. “Minutes…hours- those words are meaningless here. We shall measure time by steps,” she decided.

After a while, Sara and Chloe learned Muriel’s meaning, and knew now that the nymph wanted them to be ready within the next ten minutes. They dressed quickly, washed their teeth and faces with cold water, picked up their packs and went out into the foggy dawn.

The villagers were all awake, scurrying here and there with mugs of water and tea, last minute items necessary for the trip like, extra cloaks, food, swords, arrows, and tearful kisses of farewell. The same long tables that groaned under the weight of last night’s feast held steaming mugs of strong tea, ale, water, porridge, bread and cheese. Most of the sprite females were serving breakfast and many wept with fear.

Sara sipped a mug of tea and studied the assembled army. There were two sprites, two elves, four humans, four dwarves, one unicorn, one nymph, thirty- two cats and surprisingly, two giants… a married couple named, Fruman and Shura. The teens had learned that giants were earth elementals, and extremely timid. They had been ruthlessly hunted by human beings throughout history, and viewed man now with fear and resentment.

Human beings overall, did not understand that giants were rock movers and followed a compulsion whispered to them by the earth itself. They sometimes caused rockslides, impromptu dams, and stony fields. They also, however, held back floodwaters, avalanches, and lava flows. Unfortunately, humans usually only saw the negative impact giants made in their world, and went after them in revenge.

It did not help matters that giants were not an attractive species. Their huge boulder-like faces and massive limbs struck fear into the hearts of man, and humans did not understand that the giants were blessed by the elementals of earth, and that their imperatives were designed- a check and balance system that kept the planet spinning evenly on its axis.

Nate joined them a while later, and after that, William Smithers walked up with his own mug of something that made the teen’s eyes sting. He grimaced and muttered, “Its medicine for my rhuemitiz…”

He regarded the teenagers through the steam from his mug, and asked, “Are you children ready for this? It’s going to be trippy.”

Chloe turned to smile at Rondel and his sister as they approached, but Sara and Nate stared at the old man with surprise. They had noticed that everyone in this realm spoke formally, and Muriel especially, grew quite annoyed when Sara said something like “Cool!” or, “Awesome!”
 
Hearing a modern phrase from this man’s lips made them wonder what time-period he actually came from.

“When did you come here?” Nate did not think that William would mind the question too much. He seemed friendly enough, and just as interested in them as they were in him.

William grinned. “Now there’s a story. I was in a rock and roll band once, back in the 60’s called, the Silly-Cybens. We never made it big, but we were starting to develop a cult following in the L.A. and San Francisco underground, and opened a couple of times for bands like Jefferson Airplane, and Blue Oyster Cult.” He scratched his head and frowned.

“It was excellent, but there were a lot of drugs in that world… and a lot of parties. One night I was partying with the band, when I got really stoned and wandered off into the woods. It was somewhere in northern Cally, I don’t remember exactly where, but when I woke up, I was here.” He smiled and shrugged.

“I tried, for a long time, to find my way back, but I was so messed up I kept getting turned around. I was no spring chicken, even then, you know. I was forty four-years-old when I first joined the band.” He snorted. “…forty four going on fourteen. Anyway, I wandered around for years and finally got kind of a reputation here as a good musician, and they let me stay. They made me this fiddle, and it’s been my best friend in this strange land for almost fifty years.” He sighed, stroking the battered, but still beautiful instrument fondly.

 
Looking back at the two teens, he continued. “Now the fae use me as a go-between,” he said. “I got kind of depressed a couple of decades ago, and told a certain wood nymph…” he glanced over to where Muriel stood talking with Sylvan and his family. “… that, I missed people and even though I had lost track of my own family, I wanted to see how they were doing, and if anyone I knew was even alive.”

He shuddered. “That was in the early 90’s, and I was never so glad to get back home as I was then.
 
My people were all long gone and what friends I thought I had were either dead and buried, or executive types for corporate America. My God, the planet has gone to the dogs! Still, the fae need intelligence, so every few years I go topside and see what human beings are up to.”