ask for.” Roel laughed and said, “Given the dining habits of you and Laurent and our sire, the entire hog would vanish in but moments.”
Blaise broke out in laughter and nodded his agreement.
As onward they rode they spoke of game and hunting and good meals and other such talk, and they stopped occasionally to water the steeds and give them a bit of grain, as well as to take a bite of food or drink and to stretch their legs and otherwise relieve themselves.
But these pauses were short ere they resumed travel through Celeste’s realm. Occasionally they passed by farms, where pigs wallowed and chickens scattered and cows and sheep grazed on green slopes. Farmers and their wives and children oft came to their fences of split rails or stacked fieldstone, and they would remove their hats and bow and curtsey as the princess rode past. Some of these folk were human, while others were small brown men and women that Celeste called Hobs, a folk somewhat like Brownies, though quite mischievous and given to pranks. And at one place they passed, the crofter seemed to be a Gnome.
The princess never failed to acknowledge these subjects of hers as on passed the rade, and when she was gone the farmers and wives returned to their tasks of driving geese and milking cows and gathering eggs and sweeping floors and mucking stalls and other such chores and domesticities.
On rode the cavalcade, while Celeste and the others spoke of this and that, of twilight walls and the wonders of Faery, of grimoires and amulets and swords and rings and other things of magic, all of them quite rare.
“But what of Coeur d’Acier?” asked Avelaine. “Is it not a magic blade from Faery?”
“Ah, Heart of Steel,” said Celeste, glancing at Roel and the sword at his side. “Flashed in silver and bound by runes it is, and hence does not twist the aethyr, and therefore Roel can bring it into Faery without facing the wrath of the Fey. It is indeed a marvelous blade, but it came from the mortal world.”
“Non,” objected Emile. “If I understand Sage Geron’s words and those of Roel, it might instead have come from the Three Sisters, and if the three Fates are not of Faery, then whence come they?”
“That I do not know,” said Celeste. “The Sisters Wyrd, Lot, and Doom are an enigma unto themselves, and who can say whether or no they are Fey? Not I nor any I know. But as to Coeur d’Acier, it was Sage Geron who gave it to Roel there in the mortal world.”
“A fine point, I would say,” said Emile, lifting an eyebrow askance.
Celeste laughed. “Indeed it is.”
And so they left it that way, with no further explanation, as four separate cavalcades in four separate domains respectively rode through the Springwood, the Summerwood, the Autumnwood, and the Winterwood, all heading starwise toward the completely surrounded demesne of the Castle of the Seasons.
. .
In midafternoon a full day later, into Valeray and Saissa’s realm rode the four individual retinues, and were Lady Simone able to see each one enter she would have said the entourage of the Springwood came in from the east, while that of Alain’s Summerwood entered from the south, and Liaze’s Autumn shy; wood contingent broached the west, while Borel’s Winterwood band, with its Wolfpack leading, entered from the north.
Indeed, though all fared through the marked places on their own starwise margins-the sunlight fading as they neared the ebon heart and then returning as they passed through-they emerged travelling dawnwise, sunwise, duskwise, and starwise into their sire and dam’s domain-one moment they were travelling starwise, and the next in another direction, all but the Summerwood band, that is, for starwise they continued.
In the warm breeze, three of the rades paused to shed cloaks and other outer clothes, especially those from the Winterwood, for they had come into summertime here in this small realm.
And as the sun slid down the sky, on they rode toward the distant castle, with its tall, gleaming spires rearing high and flying long banners of
Nigh sunset, one after another the cavalcades arrived on the castle grounds, and, as each did, the men in the war bands sounded horns, signaling the identity of their principality, answered in kind by horns from the ramparts, proclaiming the king’s own call. And across the drawbridge above the moat rode the four contingents, the heavy wood of the span ringing under hooves, and then on flagstone as they passed through the gates.
In the courtyard beyond, the full staff of the castle was turned out, all but the ward on the walls, and gaiety swirled about as did the breeze while families and friends and acquaintances were reunited and lovers met lovers again. And amid the delight of reunion, squealing and laughing and riding high on Borel’s shoulder, three-summers- old Prince Duran-waving his toy horse in the air and calling out, “Asphodel!”-was paraded around the bailey, with a small brown sparrow flying about both man and child and chirping in jubilation, while four deadly knights-Luc, Roel, Laurent, and Blaise-smiled and embraced and clapped one another on the back and spoke of a testing of mettle. And amid this hullabaloo, the Wolves looked to Borel for instruction and, receiving none, looked toward his mate Michelle, for Borel had been teaching her their language, yet she, too, was caught up in the greetings and gave them no guide, and so they flopped down upon shaded stone.
And as the sun slid into the horizon, pursued by a fingernail-thin crescent of a moon, mid all the babble, Queen Saissa, her black hair astir in the breeze, her black eyes snapping with urgency, gathered Celeste and Liaze and Camille, and said, “As soon as you are freshened up, fetch Lady Simone and Michelle and meet me in the green room, for surely we must talk.”
Preparation
“Ah, a monkshood leaf preserved on its autumnal cusp- perfect,” muttered Hradian as she scrabbled among her ingredients. “Powerful she was, but a fool, Little Sister Iniqui. . Now for a chrysalis. Yes, here is one. Wait, wait, my love, this is of a death’s-head moth. Not good. Not good. Instead I need a- Ah, where did I. .? How Iniqui died, a mystery, but I knew she was after the paramour of that trull Liaze. . Here we are, the chrysalis of the
Irritated, Hradian moved away from the workbench and through the doorway and onto a platform jutting out some foot or so above the scum-laden mire. On the flet squatted an overlarge, bloated toad, one of its eyes shut as if asleep, but the other one open and watching for a midge or fly or other insect straying within range. Hradian hissed words at the warty creature. Its long tongue lashed out to snatch a large fluttering moth from the foetid air, and, after a moment of swallowing, the toad waddled to the edge of the overhang and toppled off to plop into the bog; with awkward but strong strokes of bulbous hind legs, and ineffective and feeble strokes of tiny forelegs, down it dived under the surface of the ooze.
Hradian returned to the workbench and made ready-moving things from here to there, setting a tin pot upon a tripod and placing a small but unlit fat-burner beneath. She laid out on the table an especially prepared square of vellum, its color flesh-tone, though nigh alabaster, and she weighted down the corners with odds and ends to hold it flat. She arranged other jars and vials and laid out ingredients and examined all, often referring to her grimoire. Finally satisfied, she waited, for there was little else she could do until the last component was obtained. Then she sat on the high stool and shifted a candle closer to her spell book. But even as she idly turned through the pages describing the preparation of the potion, her thoughts were upon revenge.
“First to die was Rhensibe,” Hradian muttered, her mind going back to the day in a ramshackle tavern when she discovered that her eldest sister had been slain. .
. .
No one took note of the old woman entering the small saloon to set her bundle of twigs down by the door. She shook out her shawl, drops of rain flying wide. Then, through the reek of unwashed bodies and acrid woodsmoke and days-old vomit and piss and belch and fart, slowly she made her way among the gathering to the wooden plank that served as a bar. The babble of conversation did not pause, for remarkable news had come by the tinker standing at the fireplace and warming himself.
“Tore apart, she was.”
“How?”
“By the prince’s very own hands, I hear.”
