The Bristling Wood - Katharine Kerr [115]
“My thanks, my friends. Come travel along with me for a while. I’ll sing you the song I promised, but I’ve got to make speed. A good friend of mine has been well and truly ensorceled.”
In a flood of silver light the dawn climbed up purple mountains and washed over the meadow, a green torrent of grass that swirled in the summer wind. Jill sat on their blankets and watched Perryn, crouched down by the fire, where he was heating water in a little iron kettle. He took his razor, a bit of soap, and a cracked mirror out of his saddlebags and began to shave, as calmly and efficiently as if he were in a bedchamber. Jill had a vague thought of slitting his throat with the long, sharp steel razor, or perhaps her silver dagger, but thinking was very difficult.
“You’d best eat somewhat,” he remarked.
“In a bit.” Speaking was difficult, too. “I’m not truly hungry.”
Idly she looked away, only to see her gray gnome, hunkered down some yards beyond Perryn. She was so glad to see the little creature that she jumped up and ran over, but just as she bent down to pick it up, it snarled, swiped at her with its claws, and vanished. Very slowly she sat down right where she was, wondering why the gnome was so angry at her. It seemed that she should know, but the memory wouldn’t return. She picked up a pebble from the grass and stared at it, a constant wavering flow of crystalline structure made visible, until Perryn came to fetch her away.
All that morning they rode through the forest, following long, roundabout trails. Every tree was a living presence, leaning over the trail and reaching down to her with brushy fingers. Some frightened her; others seemed perfectly harmless; still others, a definite few, seemed to be asking her to befriend them with a trembling outreach of leafy hands. When she looked away from the trail, the forest changed into a maze of solid walls, broken only by shafts of sunlight as heavy as stone. Although at times Jill considered simply riding away from Perryn, she was hopelessly lost. Every now and then, she thought of Rhodry and wondered if he was trying to follow them. She doubted that he’d believe her when she told him that she hadn’t ridden away of her own free will—if, indeed, he ever caught them. How could he find her, when the whole world had changed?
Every color, even the somber gray of the rocks, seemed as bright and glowing as a jewel. Whenever they came to a clearing or a mountain meadow, the sun poured over her like water; she could swear that she felt it dripping and running down her arms. The sky was a solid dome of lapis lazuli, and for the first time in her life she truly believed that the gods traveled across the sky the way we travel across the earth, just because the color truly did seem fit for divinities. Under the heavy burden of all this beauty, she felt as if she were reeling in her saddle, and at times tears ran down her face, just from the loveliness. Once as they rode through a meadow, a pair of larks broke cover and flew, singing their heartbreaking trill as they went up and up into the azure, crystalline sky, their wings rushing and beating in a tiny thunder. Jill saw then that whatever else might happen, that moment, that beating of wings, that stripe of sound would all endure eternally, as indeed would every moment, a clear note in the unfolding music of the universe. When she tried to tell Perryn of the insight, he only stared at her and told her she was daft. She laughed, agreeing with him.
That afternoon, they camped early near a good-sized stream. Perryn took a line and hook from his gear, remarked that he was after fish, and wandered away upstream. For a long time Jill lay on the bank and stared into the water, watching the Wildfolk in the eddies, a white foam of little faces, traces of sleek bodies, little voices and lives, melding and blending into each other. It seemed that there was something that they wanted of her, and finally she stripped off her clothes and joined them. Giggling, laughing, she ducked and splashed in the water with the undines, tried to catch them as they