Chapter 4 #2
“Sure,” he said. “Other people call that procrastinating, but whatever. Instead of writing about an adventure, why don’t you get back out there and slay something?”
I took a vicious bite of bread and washed it down with a gulp of water from the tankard on the table.
“I’ll slay you.”
“Nice, Sister. Look, I may have the perfect next quest for you.”
I paused. “What?”
Zig’s hands danced over the worn wood, picking at the grain, his fingers tapping in anxious energy, a card flashing between his knuckles every now and then. His knee juddered beneath the table. His eye twitched, and between his fingers he twirled a pendant on a chain he wore.
“Out with it,” I said, setting down a bit of the cheese. “What mischief have you done now?”
“Me?” he asked, feigning innocence. “Are you addressing me? Your brother, who has not done a single wrong thing in his entire life? Your blameless, innocent little brother?”
“You were in the stocks three days ago for selling fake treasure maps.”
“Slander.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely. That bard promised me those directions were real. I merely transcribed the information readily available in her song. If anyone was upset, they should’ve taken it up with her. Spreading misinformation like she was.”
My stomach clenched when his scenario hit a little too close to home. “Right. On the day I returned, you were thrown out and banned from a tavern.”
He threw up his hands. “It’s not cheating.
It’s not my fault the other players sucked.
” He tore off a hunk of bread and took a bite.
“By the way, that tavern owner has a poster of you tacked outside about how you love his ale. You should make him pay you for your endorsement. At the very least, for your image. It’s called branding, and now that you are retired, you should really look into cultivating diverse revenue streams.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You’re avoiding the topic. A topic, I might add, that you brought up. So let me ask again—what have you done?”
“First, I just have a question for you, mighty Ellinore who has recently slain the giant spider of the Dark Wood and has completed other miraculous deeds, like tricking the Lady in the Sea for her pearl and saving a town from a volcano and blah, blah, blah.”
“Nice.”
He shrugged. “The accolades get long after a bit. Anyway, what do you know of the Elder Beast?”
I arched an eyebrow as alarm bells went off in my head.
I took a swallow of water, then set down my tankard.
Where would he have learned of the Elder Beast?
I’d heard only a handful of stories that referenced the myth, and none of the books I’d read as a child even mentioned it.
The Elder Beast wasn’t a being that would come up in casual conversation. “Um… why?”
He plunked his elbow onto the table and held his chin in his hand. “Because I want to know.” He prodded me with the toe of his boot, the pointy edge jabbing into my calf muscle. “So tell me.”
“It’s a beast.”
“I gathered.”
I shrugged. “I’ve only heard about it a few times. It’s not a popular story subject. I don’t know much about it.”
“Oh, don’t be difficult. I may not have been as enamored with mythical stories as a child as you were”—that was a lie, evident by all the “magical” items Zig had purchased with his chore money—“but I occasionally listened to the bards and storytellers. They sang of all kinds of beastly things in their songs. You must remember something.”
“I’m not being difficult. I honestly know very little.”
“Then tell me what you do know.”
“Um… I think it’s an ancient? Possibly a chimera, like a griffin or a manticore, in that it has attributes of a few different creatures. Like the legs of a bull and the face of a deer and the wings of an eagle. I’m not quite certain, but it sounds vaguely terrifying.”
“Huh,” Zig said. “You’ve never seen it, then? Never encountered it on an adventure?”
I laughed and bit into the cheese. “No. Never.”
“Never?”
“Never. It’s said to live in an invisible realm.
No one has even claimed to have seen it for decades, probably longer.
And if it’s anything like the other beasts, it’s dangerous.
I doubt anyone who has beheld it survived long enough to tell anyone.
” I took another bite of cheese. “Why are you so interested, anyway?”
Zig’s bright smile dropped away, replaced by a nervous tremble of his lips. He rubbed his hand over his stubbled chin, then through his hair, tugging on the ends with a fist.
“How…,” he said, voice a worried creak, “how would someone find it?”
“Did I mention it lives in an invisible realm? I’ve traveled the majority of this kingdom, and I’ve never seen it.
I’ve barely heard of it, and as you pointed out, I was the one who sat rapt at the campfire during celebrations to listen to the storytellers when we were children.
I was the one who read the scrolls that travelers would bring from other parts of the kingdom.
I imagine someone would have to stumble upon it and live to tell the tale for anyone else to find it. ”
“Oh,” he said, voice small. “That’s… unfortunate.”
I straightened from my slouch. The alarm bells rose in pitch and frequency, and my stomach clenched, chasing away my appetite. “Why, Zig? Why do you suddenly care about the Elder Beast?”
He licked his lips. Then raised his hands in a preemptive placating gesture. “Promise you won’t get mad.”
“No.”
He frowned. “Aw, come on.”
“No. What did you do?” I gripped the edge of the table, the beveled wood biting into my palms. “Does this have something to do with lunch? Tell me I didn’t just eat Elder Beast.”
“What?” He crinkled his nose. “No.” He waved his hands and laughed. “You literally just said it’s impossible to find. How would that meat be Elder Beast?”
“I don’t know! Stranger things have happened!”
“Well, that’s not one of them!” His voice went shrill.
“Then what? And don’t lie,” I said, pointing my finger at him.
He wilted, thin lips pressed into a line.
“Well, I happened to be in the Green Serpent, and I’d had a few tankards. And I overheard this council of mages gabbing on and on about needing a horn of some kind—”
“A horn?” I asked, cutting him off.
“Yeah.” He shrugged.
“And you… walked out and left?” I crossed my fingers under the table, hoping that my brother had taken the prudent road for once.
He winced, then scratched the side of his head, his brown hair sticking on end. “I maybe made a bet with them.”
And so much for hope. “You did what?” My voice went low and threatening.
“They said no one could defeat the Elder Beast. How no one would even dare try. Not even Ellinore the Brave, Strong, and Mighty, and this was after we all had to endure a bard singing about your greatest feats. They said if they had the creature’s horn, they could make a thing that could help a lot of people.
They promised a reward. A massive reward.
And really? Besmirching your name and legacy right in front of me like that. What was I supposed to do?”
“Ignore them!” I slammed my hands on the table. Ink from the well sloshed over the lip, staining the edge of my journal. “You’re supposed to ignore them and walk away.”
He crossed his arms and pouted. “Well, I didn’t. I told them my sister was Ellinore the Brave, the Righteous, and so on and so forth, and she could beat any man or beast set in front of her.”
“You didn’t,” I whispered.
He nodded curtly. “And things happened to spiral from there.”
“How so?”
“Well, there was a bit more mead involved and another horrific song. And I ended up wagering that you could find the beast, kill it, and bring back the horn, because you are the best at questing in the entire kingdom.”
I closed my eyes and drew on every calming technique I knew—picturing cute, fluffy kittens, counting breaths, focusing on the sensation of my feet on the floor—before I reopened them. “Zig, it’s, like, the second rule of questing to never trust a mage. They’re dicks.”
“What’s the first rule?”
“Anything can become a weapon in a pinch.”
Zig blinked. “Huh,” he said, contemplative, then he shook his head. “Anyway, how am I supposed to know that? I don’t go on quests. I don’t talk with mages. I’m not you.”
I frowned. “I know that. But it’s a moot point anyway. I’m retired.”
“I know. But they promised gold. You know that’s my one weakness.”
I bit my tongue to stop myself from listing his many weaknesses. I wouldn’t be drawn into a petty fight over Zig’s reckless behavior. That was the last thing I wanted, especially since I was still trying to convince him to move to the coast to be with me and our parents.
“Okay. So you made a bet. What were the stakes?”
At this, he sat up straight and his eyes sparkled. “Like I said, if you do it, they give us gold. Like, a lot of gold. So much gold.”
“I have gold.”
He shook his head. “Not the measly purses you won at court. More. So much more.”
“And if I fail?”
“You won’t.”
“Zig,” I said, exasperated, “I’m not going on a grand adventure to find the Elder Beast. I don’t care for how much gold,” I added when he opened his mouth to protest. “So let’s pay the loser’s share and move on with our lives. Then we can leave and join Mom and Pop.”
Zig pressed his palm to his chest, his fingers curling in the fabric of his tunic. “I can’t.”
I dropped my head into my hand. “Zig, I know you don’t want to move, but I think it would be good for our whole family and—”
“No. I can’t pay the loser’s share.”
I snapped my head up. “What? Why? What did you promise them if I fail?”
He didn’t answer right away, his mouth parted in worry, his eyes wide.
“Zig?” I prompted. “What did you wager?”
His throat bobbed. “Um… my heart?”
I jumped to my feet. The chair clattered behind me. “Your what?” My stomach dropped to the floor. “You didn’t.”
Zig stood. “I didn’t mean to! They tricked me with their magical ways and their promises of a lot of money.
And they kept sliding full mugs of mead in my direction, and the bard was droning on and on about how great you are, and I figured, Why not?
She’s not busy right now anyway. How was I supposed to know that killing the Elder Beast was, like, a difficult thing to do? ”
“Because of the amount of money! That should’ve been the first clue!”
“Well! You’re the best adventurer in the land! You’ve defeated a hundred malicious creatures. You’ve retrieved divine implements and saved princesses. You have songs written all about your feats that I’m forced to hear daily! I thought it was something within your area of expertise!”
I gritted my teeth. Placing my hands on the table, I hung my head, my tangled hair dangling in front of me, my shoulders bunched. I couldn’t fault him for that. I hadn’t confessed that the tales weren’t true. I hadn’t told him. This was my fault.
“Okay. It’s okay.” I pushed up and placed my hands on my hips. “We’ll go talk to this council of mages and get this fixed. Easy peasy.”
A stuttered sigh of relief blew past Zig’s parted lips, and his body sagged. “You think that will work?”
“Yeah,” I said with false confidence, rolling my shoulders and twisting my torso as I would do before facing down an opponent. “No big deal. Happens all the time.”
“And if they don’t listen?”
“I’m Ellinore the Strong. The Brave. The Mighty. Trust me.”
He nodded. “Okay. Okay. Great.”
I gripped his shoulder and squeezed. “No worries, Zig. We’ll take care of it. It’s fine.”
He smiled tightly. “Okay. But, uh… just in case… can you take your sword?”
That was not a bad idea. I nodded. “Yeah.”
“And brush your hair? Maybe wash up a bit and put on your boots?”
“Fine,” I said, stalking toward the other room. “Then we’ll go. And it will all work out.”
It would be no problem. These mages would understand. Mistakes like this happened all the time. It was okay, wonderful even. An easy fix that would work itself out, and Zig and I would come back home and laugh like we did when we were children.
It’d all be fine.