Chapter 42 #2
“Round Boy!” cried Zyll, clapping her hands with clear delight.
Round Boy was, indeed, very round. The tiny, shaggy, extremely portly pony was hitched to an equally tiny four-wheeled cart, eminently Zyll-sized.
Delvyn departed when he was certain he was no longer needed, leaving Astryx, Fern, and Zyll standing in the street alongside three horses and a wagon, while Tabba and Hemp goggled at them from the doorway of the bounty office.
Zyll dashed to greet her pony, scrubbing him vigorously under the chin and on the cheeks and jabbering what Fern assumed were goblin endearments. Round Boy, for his part, seemed equally pleased.
Astryx and Fern stood beside one another, watching with a shared sense of unreality. The Oathmaiden held the bank chit beside her leg in one hand, forgotten. She looked adrift.
Returning to them, Zyll hitched up her coat of pockets and made a little bow. “Okay. Off to be going, with many thank-lings.”
She patted Fern gently on the shoulder. “Be good to shankling.”
“Oh!” Fern had forgotten Breadlee. She drew him from the pocket of her tattered cloak. Astryx had made a show of bestowing him on her, but . . . “He’s not really mine.”
“Glad we’re clear on that,” grumbled the knife. “Wielding is a privilege, not a right.”
Shaking her head, Zyll pressed him gently back toward Fern.
She moved on to Astryx and stared up at her for a long, inscrutable moment. Then, startling Fern and the Oathmaiden both, Zyll seized the elf’s legs in a full-body hug.
Astryx’s mouth worked as she stared, bewildered, at the goblin.
Tentatively, she reached down and patted her orange hair.
Zyll detached herself and backed away, blinking at them.
“Okay okay. Bye.”
She crawled up to the buckboard of her cart beside the unlit lantern that hung from its awning, and with a brisk wave, twitched the reins.
Round Boy clattered off down the street, and they both disappeared out of sight around the bend.
“I’m gonna miss that little weirdo, theoretically,” mused Breadlee aloud.
The strength seemed to leave Astryx’s legs all at once, and she sat down hard on the curb, staring at the bank chit in her hand. Nigel’s sheath twisted awkwardly on her back.
“Are you okay?” asked Fern, putting a paw on her shoulder.
“I feel like the road took a turn in the dark,” murmured the elf, still gazing at the slip of paper.
She looked at Fern, her eyes rimmed red. “Like time is slipping away, except I’ve always had so much of it until now. I feel . . . rushed. I asked you a question before, but didn’t get an answer. And perhaps it’s possible you think better of me now. So, I’m going to ask it again, before I can’t.”
Fern’s heart seized as Astryx shifted onto one knee and withdrew Nigel from his scabbard. She planted him point down in the street and bowed her head as though in prayer.
“What are you doing?” whispered Fern.
“Fern,” said Astryx, her voice quiet and firm.
“I, Astryx Arboren, last of my line, beg of you your companionship, your courage, your community. In return you shall have mine, and between them may loyalty bind us.” She swallowed.
“Will you accompany me on the roads ahead, treacherous or fair, as my squire and friend, for as long as it please you?”
Dizziness swallowed Fern whole. Before her, another friend who needed her, wanted her, to fill a space—a space she uniquely fit into. A need she could meet. A thing that she could be, to bridge a gap in someone else’s road. Worthy. Useful. Valuable.
She tore her eyes from Astryx, awaiting her answer, to stare at the overstuffed satchel at her side. So many letters, all starting the same. Dear Viv.
So many apologies, stretching back weeks.
And before that, years, to a father long dead, to the dream of his that she’d inherited and lived for him.
Fern took a deep breath as tears over-spilled, wetting the fur of her cheeks. In a small and quavering voice, she uttered the hardest word of her life.
“No.”
At the parting of ways outside the gates of Amberlin, they stood together beside the horse and pony, Persimmon newly outfitted with a saddle suitable for a rattkin.
Astryx had insisted Fern take a share of the bounty. Fern had accepted it uncomfortably, and certainly hadn’t counted whatever was in the purse the Oathmaiden had tucked into the pony’s saddlebag.
Kneeling before her, Astryx withdrew the bracelet that had last girdled Zyll’s wrist. Delicate wire glittered in the afternoon sun.
She offered it to Fern in an open palm. “If ever you need me, or decide you’d like to walk the same road together for a while, place this on your wrist, and we will both know how to find one another. ”
Fern took it in one paw and studied it. “Didn’t you say that at long distances, there’s pain?”
Astryx tapped the bracelet still around her own wrist and smiled. “I find that some things are worth pain. You’ll know if and when this is worth it to you.”
Sniffling, Fern nodded and tucked it away in her cloak.
“Oh, there’s someone else who likely wants a word.” The elf reached over her shoulder and loosed Nigel in his scabbard.
There was the air of somebody straightening their tunic, followed by the sound of a clearing throat, and then Nigel’s voice declared, “There are few I deem worthy of my lady’s regard. In you, however, I can find little fault. Be well, and travel safe.”
“Can’t help but feel somebody has been left out,” muttered Breadlee.
Nigel harrumphed.
“Take good care of her, Nigel,” said Fern, thumping Breadlee with a finger to hush him.
Mustering up the last of her courage, she took Astryx’s hand in both her paws, and said in a wobbly voice, “Thank you for harboring me when I stumbled out of my life. Thank you for protecting me. Thank you for enduring me. Thank you for wanting me to be something you needed. And thank you for understanding when I couldn’t. ”
Halfway through, her vision was a blur.
“Fuck,” she whispered.
Then Astryx hugged her, burying her face in the fur beneath Fern’s ear. “Goodbye, my unexpected friend,” she murmured. “You have made my road a stranger, but I am so grateful to find my way by starlight again. I’m very glad you fell asleep in the back of my wagon.”