11. Renard #2
“Well, that’s not nearly as thrilling as I’d hoped,” she returns.
There’s a pause, and it sounds like she’s rousing herself from her bedroll, much to the exasperation of her corpse weasel.
“As to your earlier question, I, too, am low on rations. However, Nibblebones is a very capable huntress, should we need fresh meat. And I can always summon mushrooms, if you’re not too…
particular about them now. I mean, after last night. ”
Her words take on an anxious edge, and my heart drops.
“You have nourished me well thus far with your gifts, Lady Fae. I would not be so foolish to refuse them just because I have more insight into their origins.”
She relaxes a fraction at that—again, obviously waiting for the disgust, the rejection that I am determined not to disappoint her with. What I’m to do about her becoming the Blight Mother, however, is another matter entirely, and not one I’m particularly keen on examining at this moment.
“Would you like to talk about it?” she asks of a sudden. “What happened last night, I mean.”
I purse my lips. “I believe the more important question is, would you?”
She keeps her attention fixed on the low fire.
I become suddenly interested in arranging the edge of my sleeve over my wrist, a task that requires no thought and an abundance of attention.
We both remember what happened last night…
and what almost happened. Neither of us seems to possess the bravery to mention it.
She sighs after a time, opens her mouth to begin, then closes it abruptly. Shaking her head, she huffs a sardonic chuckle.
“For so long, all I wanted was to vent my spleen at anyone who might do me the courtesy of listening. And now that someone has offered, I cannot think of a single thing to say that I did not already sob into the ether last night, through a haze of pain and shame. You have known me for the least amount of time, Renard, and already I have admitted more to you than to my own kin.”
“I know little about you and your past, but I gather your gift—your decay magic—is a rather unique one. Yet it is part of the cycle of life, is it not? And if your people are so governed by their relationship with the natural order of things, why is it that you are shunned?”
She shrugs, but the movement is stiff with tension.
“You’re asking questions I’ve asked for all my years.
What I do might be useful in the grand scheme of the gods, but it’s hardly something to be championed or put on display over a dinner table.
We’re not technically immortal, Renard—we can be killed, we can grow sick, we eventually die.
But we do so on a much longer cycle than you humans, so according to your kind, we are by rights immortal.
That false immortality, however, sets my people so firmly in our ways.
Perhaps we live too long and thus become blind to how the world needs to change.
In that respect, you humans have the better of us. ”
“Despite my familiarity with death, somehow I don’t envy your kind their long lives,” I admit. “And I rather think those of my kind who would hoard their years would do so selfishly, for no greater purpose than to guard their own pleasures.”
“Well, for all our immortality, the fae have a peculiar relationship with what may lead to or follow death, and so I’m best forgotten, until the beer needs to be fermented, or the cheese aged, or the compost turned.
And, I suppose, it did not help that I was a difficult youngling who delighted in playing pranks on my elders by rotting or rusting their favorite things,” she says, smiling to herself at the memory.
I try not to be charmed by the idea of a small, oxblood-eyed, white-haired fae running amok in a kitchen, destroying things on a precocious whim.
“Do you think your magic is why the seer marked you out as the Blight Mother?”
“I don’t know. But I intend to find out. The village is half a day from here, so if we hurry, we can reach it before nightfall.”
I feed Magnar the last of the oats and lead him to a pool of clean, clear water deeper in the cave.
He seems to have rested better than the rest of us, fortunately.
After tending to him, we pack without much more conversation.
The fire has gone to ash by the time we are ready to leave.
The glowing mushrooms along the ceiling have dimmed as well, their caps curling inward and I wonder if they will shrivel entirely without proximity to Vireth’s magic.
Outside, the mountain has been remade beneath a fresh canvas of snow. The air is sharp with cold, made worse by breezes that shear through the passageways and send muffled whumpfs of snow falling from overburdened pine boughs.
There are tracks from the pack of wolves, but no sign of them today. It seems they’ve returned to the thicker forest below the cave mouth after being drawn in by Vireth’s magic—or her transformation.
We pick our way down the path carefully.
The treacherous snow hides stones both jagged and loose, making for slow going.
Twice I offer my hand to Vireth over the worst stretches, and both times she ignores me.
The third time she slips—nearly tumbling over the precarious side of the mountain slope—she catches my forearm with a sharp inhale.
Her fingers grip my arm hard enough to bruise my flesh through the layers of my clothing.
Heart thudding from the thought of what might have been, I steady her until she regains her footing. “Are you hurt?”
She grunts. “Simply my pride. You don’t need to look quite so pleased with yourself.”
“I’m not!” I’m careful to school my expression in chivalrous neutrality.
“You are!”
She releases me and moves ahead with great dignity, which is somewhat undermined by Nibblebones skittering after her with what looks suspiciously like a human rib bone in her mouth.
“No,” she tells her corpse weasel without turning around. “Leave it with the dead, little one.”
Nibblebones freezes, her gaze imploring.
“No,” Vireth insists, her hands on her hips. The rib drops into the snow, and the corpse weasel makes a forlorn sound that tugs at my heartstrings.
“It is always difficult to be denied what one loves,” I offer the little creature.
Vireth looks over her shoulder. “Do not encourage her, or she will have us carting sacks of skulls down the mountainside. Trust me, that is not a trade good we want to offend the villagers with should we stumble upon any inhabitants between here and our destination.”
“I am merely offering sympathy. She has suffered disappointment.”
Nibblebones squeaks in acknowledgement and climbs atop my shoulder. Magnar nickers with ill-disguised jealousy.
“So have I, yet no one lets me carry human bones about,” Vireth mutters.
“I suspect you could if you truly wished.”
Her mouth twitches before she turns away, and the triumph warms me like a first-time champion in a joust.
It becomes plain that the antlers trouble her as we continue our descent down the back side of the mountain.
She rolls her neck every few minutes, reaching up to rub at the angry red scalp skin that surrounds them.
Every now and then, she sucks in a breath that’s laced with suffering, until I can bear it no longer.
When we reach a frozen stream that cuts through the valley, she stops to study her reflection in the icy water.
She pushes her hood back and I grimace at the state of her—her hair has tangled badly in the night, woven through with pine needles and bits of dirt.
One silky lock of hair is wound around the base of the left antler, and the skin there looks raw, though no longer bleeding.
She looks tired, exasperated, and rather upset. Cold enough that her nose has gone faintly pink at the tip. Unfortunately, none of that makes her less beautiful.
“I look horrifying,” she growls. “A right mess.”
“I don’t know about that. You do look cold, though.”
“Renard.” Her eyes narrow, much of her good humor and curiosity having fled with subsequent nights of poor rest, poorer food, and even poorer company.
Before I can stop myself, I crouch beside my pack and search through my supplies until I find a small comb tucked near the spare bandages. Vireth eyes it—and me—with deep suspicion.
“What are you doing?”
I blow out a breath and beckon her closer. “Nothing untoward, Lady Fae. Simply hoping to set a bit of your discomfort at ease.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she shoots back, trying and failing to disentangle her locks from the knots they’ve tightened into.
“Vireth, you’ve saved my life several times over now. Please allow me to help you. Come here.”
“That phrase historically ends badly for women,” she scoffs.
“Well, if it makes you feel any better, I give you leave to stab me if necessary.”
“That’s… actually rather generous.” All her tugging and pulling has made the mess of her hair even worse, and her arms drop to her sides in defeat.
Still, she hesitates, but not as long as she might have yesterday.
Finally she deflates, sitting on a fallen log beside the stream and turning her back to me.
I take the place behind her, fingers trembling more than I’d care to admit. It must be the cold.
Her hair is like the finest silk thread I’ve ever touched, and lifting it from her back envelopes me with the faint smell of rosemary—even beneath the scent of the cave and the smoke from our fires. With naught but a breath between us, I wonder if she can hear the echoing beat of my heart.
I begin working the comb through the ends of her hair. Vireth goes very still.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” I say.
“One can never be certain.”
“I have braided hair before.” A flash of memory surfaces—my fingers weaving dark strands together, my heart hopeful, content. Guilt whispers through me and Vireth tenses, making a move to turn but thinking better of it.
“You have?” she asks.