Chapter 11: Caveat Cavalcade
Lummeweiss breathed deeply and knocked gently on the ornate door of the largest wagon in the caravan. Vashti was rumored to have been the oldest Romani wise woman that any of the familia of any clan had ever known. Legends and myths that floated around the younger members in passing whispers and among the older parents in wonder when they thought no one was listening, said that the old woman had been blessed by the Erlking after offering her life to save her younger brother. It was said that the boy had been suffering from a magical curse and the family had sent for a holy man, but Vashti had not trusted the man in the least and had set off for the Erling's treacherous palace alone. For her selflessness, the ancient king was said to have given her both wisdom and immortality. All blessings come with a price and it was also said that for this gift, Vashti was doomed to live a life never knowing the love of a man, but always knowing the love of family. She quickly became a time-honored treasure among the Gitano and Romungro alike, remaining choovihni over one clan in particular and eventually finding her way into the more exciting world of Der Volkstein.
The she-elf waited patiently in the early morning cold after knocking several times. She shuddered in the chilled air, a less violent shudder than that which had awakened her moments before. A disturbing dream had stirred her and the images reeled backwards and forwards in her mind as she stood waiting for Vashti to answer the door. Rhonzo had been nearby, but could not understand what Lummeweiss had been describing and so had sent her immediately out to see the wise-woman. The young elf's heart began to race as silence met her and nothing else. She groaned a little in frustration and knocked more loudly. A splinter lodged itself in one of her knuckles as she knocked, prompting a shriek from her lips and a small stream of blood from the back of her fingers. She drew her hand back and clutched it tightly as the gold fluid slipped from the small wound. Another set-back to having human in her was the tendency to bleed more freely. She breathed sharply as her keen ears caught the sound of the old woman shuffling towards the door and then finally her hand grasping the handle. The old, wooden door creaked loudly mimicking a screech owl as it opened. Lummeweiss looked up and swallowed hard. Vashti raised one brow inquisitively and took one step down toward the girl, holding a lantern aloft. Lumeweiss quickly composed herself and bowed respectfully to the old woman.
"I- I have had a premonition, Mama' Vashti," she said softly.
"Come inside," the old woman instructed. Lumeweiss nodded and hurried in, moving past the older woman while still clutching her hand tightly and permitting blood to only flow onto the palm of the one clasping. Vashti remained at the door a moment, gazing out at the lingering darkness. She furrowed her brow and sniffed the air. "I smell unrest, a disturbance farther away than even we can feel."
"Do you think it is the prince, his army?" Lumeweiss asked, having been told that the court of Elfland had been experiencing a great deal of unrest over the past few years but recently was practically overthrown and reformed in a matter of weeks. Vashti shook her head and closed the door softly.
"No," she muttered. "I believe it is more than the elves . . . the trolls . . . it is something younger and yet older, and far more foul."
Lumeweiss frowned as the old woman sat down on a large, comfy lounge and pulled a thick blanket around herself. She motioned for the girl to do the same with an enormous afghan lying on the back of her chair. Lumeweiss took the mottled tapestry and wrapped it around her shoulders as Vashti leaned back and drew in a deep breath. She wondered if the old woman was talking about something to the east. No, that she would have mentioned by name; Vashti was well versed in many of the goings-on in other regions and the stories behind them. No, this was something sinister and looming in the near future. Lumeweiss felt herself beginning to shudder yet again, not with cold but with fear. Something was stirring unrest in magical beings and all those that could sense their presence. This was often not a good thing and the she-elf doubted that there would be any deviating from the usual at the moment.
(*)
"You'll have to keep this bound in order for the tincture to do any good for you overnight. Stay lying down and rest or that wound will fester and allow him some sort of wicked power over you," the physician ordered firmly. Nuada looked at him with a little irritation. He hated being treated like an invalid almost as much as he hated the injury. Titania, who had remained seated by the bed focused on Nuada as the physician had treated the wound, placed a hand tenderly on his shoulder. She had, in fact, been the only reason that he had consented to allowing the physician to treat it in the first place. Puck was glad of her presence, knowing that he could not have forced the elf with words to accept the aid and that Nuada felt he had all the skills he needed to tend to himself. The pwca sat on his rabbit haunches in the corner of the room, paws folded anxiously and eyes focused on the royal as well. Wink had decided to stand guard at the door, still very peeved at both the sorcerer and himself for the incident. The physician looked at Titania. "Make sure he sleeps and eats at least once this evening." He handed her a vial and a small roll of cloth. "He needs to drink from that before eating, what is left should be poured immediately into the wound and bound quickly. It is best to let very little of the elements touch that wound until it has had a chance to be sealed."
"I'll make sure it's done," Titania said with resolve.
The physician nodded and then turned back to Nuada once more. "Good night, your majesty."
The prince-king nodded in return and watched the physician leave the room. He groaned and sat more upright prompting Titania to move an inch closer and clasp one hand over his shoulder more firmly. He turned to her. "Physician, indeed, still using the same involved and ridiculously lengthy medicines. What good is the art of healing if cannot advance to something more efficient?" he complained.
Titania sighed and put her other hand over his forearm extending to the wound now bound with layer upon layer of cloth. She stroked his forearm and frowned a little. "Elves aren't about progress, humans are. Progress requires sacrifice and that's not what your medicines do. You have healers, humans have doctors; doctors believe in sacrifice," she explained. He looked back at her in confusion. "That's why we're willing to use chemicals."
"And rape the earth and harm innocent creatures to get them," he muttered angrily. Titania glared at him as a flash of pain surged through the lines and circle forming the shape of the alfskros burned into him. He cried out and clasped his hand tightly for a moment, breathing sharply as the pain subsided. He turned and looked at Titania, realizing the anger behind her gaze. He sighed. "Sacrifice is necessary only in war. If your doctors believe in sacrifice, then they base their entire system of medicine on violence."
"Your doctors?" she said angrily. He frowned, realizing what he had just said although unable to compare them to the words that had angered her in the first place and necessitated his visit to begin with. He tried to think of something else to say, but the pain and frustration were creating too great a barrier for him. He turned away, clearly aggravated by his own limitations. Titania shook her head and stood slowly. "I'm going to go and get you something to eat. I'll be back in minute."
Puck watched her leave the room and then hopped over to the bed, placing his paws on the edge where Titania had been seated. Nuada shook his head slowly. "She has been given immortality, Puck. She is no longer human and yet she cannot separate herself from them," he reasoned aloud. "It will be a nightmare for her when the mortality of her family sets in."
"She is still human, your majesty, and that is something you must accept. Her body may live past what is normal for her kind and her spirit has been given the ability to endure past its lifespan, but she is still human," Puck corrected. Nuada frowned and closed his eyes for a moment, trying to settle his thoughts. Puck shifted and raised himself a little higher. "She is still not quite sure of you, I'm afraid. She still fears you to some degree."
"Fears me? Ha! She never feared me, not once!" the prince laughed scornfully. His mind immediately took him back to their exploration upon first meeting and their excursion to the Riddle Glen. When she had heard that he had killed his own father, she had trembled and cried just like every other victim he had seized. He frowned. "No, wait, maybe once . . ." he muttered. Puck lifted one brow and gave the prince a side glance. Nuada shook his head. "But never since then. Not once after that."
"Then why did she leave the forest shortly after Oberon's defeat?" Puck demanded.
"Because she tasted death. She feared her own mortality, then, not me," he replied hotly.
"And you are a constant reminder of that. You are immortal-born, sire, and she is not. Deep down she realizes after seeing you wounded repeatedly and brought to the brink . . . even having died as she did, that it is still possible for her to suffer an untimely end and suffer," the pwca explained further. Nuada looked to the side, suddenly realizing the truth in his consul's words. "You make her feel weak with every blow you take."
"And what can be done to stop it, then? Am I to only see her in perfect health and dispatch opposition before any chance of showing . . ." another surge of pain shot through the wound in mid-sentence. Nuada growled and clutched his hand more tightly to him. He panted for a moment as the pain subsided and Puck stared at him in disbelief. " . . . weakness."
"Sire, it is not fitting for you to prevent any reminders of her weaknesses, or your own for that matter," Puck said as he scooted a little closer and placed his paw on the prince's forearm where Titania's hand had been. "You both need to know what makes the other weak so you realize how you strengthen one another. If either of you were whole, you'd never be able to live with each other happily."
"And what makes you think we can?" Nuada said sadly.
"Oh don't you start sulking again. If you're going to get discouraged every time she has some fit of emotion that makes no rational sense then you might as well resign yourself to the life of a bachelor and set your nephew in line for the throne," Puck chastised with his paws suddenly on his hips in a very didactic way. He quickly hopped onto the bed and looked directly into his sovereign's face as sternly as any tutor giving a lesson for the umpteenth time. "Titania makes you happier than any source of joy your kind has ever known and you do the same for her. If, heaven forbid, another emotion happens to come along and make itself known then learn to cope. I'll not be saddled with the two of you hurling your bad humor at me with each and every spat." Nuada turned away with an angry snort. Puck frowned and folded his arms. "And neither will that brother-in-law of yours."
Nuada turned back to Puck and glared at him harshly. Puck glared back just as hard and more unyielding. This was clearly something that had disturbed him for some time in silence. The door creaked open a little. The two turned and watched as the blackened nose of a cat made its way through. Both sets of eyes widened. The nose belonged to the snout belonging to the head of a very large cat. The rest of the head finally inched its way through, whiskers and all. Nuada and Puck both recognized the blank expression on Ravi's face as he gazed at them. A light went on the tiger's expression as the two heard him say, "Fluffy?" Puck gasped and shrank downward a little glancing right and left at the best possible place to hide. Ravi's eyes suddenly widened and he bounded through the rest of the doors. "Fluffy!"
Puck shrieked and, without warning, leapt onto the prince's shoulders trying to hid behind his head as Ravi bounded toward them. Nuada grunted at the sudden weight of his consul sitting, quite literally, on his shoulders. He leaned forward slightly as Puck instinctively dug his claws into the elf's flesh. Nuada let out a shriek and turned to watch as the tiger skidded to a halt in front of the bed. He and Puck exchanged silent glances and it confused the prince as to why the tiger would just cease moving like that. The animal grinned and lowered its body to the floor. Puck gasped yet again. "Oh dear," he muttered and tried to look for another escape seeing that the prince would not serve as a suitable fortress. Ravi began growling playfully and Nuada could see that an attack, malicious or not, was inevitable as the tiger's hindquarters began shifting from side to side and his tail curled like a wick. As Ravi sprang upward, Puck leapt to the side, scurrying under the bed. Nuada grunted again as Ravi clambered across the prince and onto the other side of the floor.
"Fluffy?" Ravi grunted as he continued to try and push his head through the bottommost edge of the bed. Puck hid at the head where the wall was flush with the rest of the fixture. Ravi growled more loudly and flopped onto his side. He swept toward the rabbit with one paw and then the other, never really reaching close enough to touch him, but close enough to frighten poor Puck into resorting to a fetal position whimpering. "Fluffy, fluffy, fluffy!"
"Oh for Aiglinn's sake, Ravi!" Nuada suddenly shouted. The tiger froze, in awe that the elf had used his name. It had only occurred once before and not to him directly. He sat upright and stared back at the royal in anticipation. "Out." Ravi snorted at him. "Out, now." The prince growled and pointed firmly, forgetting that he was used to using the hand that he had most recently injured and that the injury was aggravated by movement. As he began to shout another command, a very great surge of pain shot through his hand and moved fully up his arm. He could have sworn that it reached his neck and pierced his head as he withdrew his hand and began panting once more. Ravi frowned and cautiously climbed back onto the bed. He circled the prince once before situating himself behind the royal and lying down. He nudged the prince's arm with his head and purred loudly. The pain began to ebb once more as Nuada turned and looked down at his beloved's companion. "You are an absolute menace," he said with irritation. Ravi snorted again and scooted closer, laying his head on the prince's thigh and looking up at him as best he could. "Why on earth has she kept you?" Ravi grunted and pulled his body closer to the elf. Nuada sighed and placed his good hand on the beast's head. If nothing else, it was an interesting sensation to touch something with such a primal spirit contained in what could be considered an innocent existence. Ravi seemed to appreciate the gesture and closed his eyes. "I wish she would overlook in me what angers her the way she overlooks in you what angers everyone else."
The doors swung open once more and Titania entered followed by one of the other servants. She gasped at seeing Ravi lying on the bed and hurried toward them. The servant said nothing and placed the tray he had been carrying on a desk and left the room with a bow. The bow and exit went unnoticed as Titania stood beside the tiger and the prince. "How on earth did he . . .?"
"He must have been wandering in the forest again," Nuada replied. "I did set that enchantment for such occasions and there have been plenty of them."
"I wish mom hadn't brought him back into captivity. He should have gone to a preserve or something," Titania muttered as she tried to pry the tiger off of bed. Ravi grunted more loudly and coiled himself all the tighter around the base of the prince. "I really wish you had set up that enchantment to send him to my house instead of out here."
"It is a way of forcing at least one interlude," Nuada confessed. Titania let go of Ravi's head and looked at her prince sadly. "I knew that even if you were too frightened or angry to enter the forest again he would and you would have to retrieve him else I would have to deliver him."
"Do you really need that many excuses to see me? I'm the Ostara, we're obligated to see each other as often as the Sisterhood calls for it." Titania noted the nonplussed look on her beloved's features and smiled. "Besides, I sometimes think about leaving him with you."
"Oh no, not on your life. I have enough on my hands, thank you." Nuada looked down at Ravi with faux disdain. "I am not going to be followed night and day by a great, hulking beast with no manners."
"No, you've still got a cave troll," Titania quipped. This prompted a look of shock from the elf. She shook her head and withdrew the vial and cloth that the physician had given her. She sighed and looked down at his hand. "Before you eat, you need to drink some of this and let me bind your hand." She moved toward him. Ravi noticed her and snorted before scooting his head further onto the prince's lap and trying to get his muzzle under the bandaged hand.
"Well, kindly put the cat out first," Nuada said, an elevating tone of irritation becoming evident in his voice. She set the vial and the cloth down and reached out, taking hold of Ravi by the scruff of his neck.
"Come on, Ravi," she grunted. The tiger tried to remain stationary and growled in protest. "Come on."
The doors to the room opened and Wink stepped in momentarily. He grunted loudly and clapped his hands together. Ravi snapped to attention and, like a dog being called home by its master, trotted contentedly past the troll and out of the room. Wink grunted and slowly turned, leaving the room muttering to himself in his own tongue. Nuada smiled. "Well, if you need another home for him, it looks like Wink would be willing to take him."
"I wasn't serious, I don't want him to leave," Titania corrected as she took the vial and pulled the stopper out. Nuada watched her intently as she took a small cup that she had brought with her and poured the grey fluid from the vial into the cup nearly to its brim.
Titania handed him the small cup and motioned for him to down it. He kept his attention focused on her while swallowing the fluid, but found it necessary to squint and suppress coughing at the bitterness of the fluid whatever it was. Having been so accustomed to either the care of trolls or himself he was unused to such a foul taste. Titania fought away the urge to snicker. As different as he saw himself from humanity, he still looked like any other child forced to take medicine they loathed. She took the cup back from him and then sat down on the edge of the bed, taking his injured hand into both of hers gracefully. He continued to watch her intently as she began unwrapping the bandages. Her movements and focus reminded him a great deal of his mother and Nuala. He felt truly overwhelmed yet again by how much he desired her and the desire was growing stronger by the day.
"You have a gift; the ability to soothe and comfort is rare," he offered. She turned and looked at him, hesitating with a measure of the cloth still in one hand. "I believe that was the very first thing that brought us together, wasn't it?"
"I thought it was you're being stranded in a forest with no food or water after an ordeal," she replied, skeptic about this sudden turn toward tender words after still harboring obvious animosity earlier. He breathed deeply as she pulled the cloth away from the wound itself and brought the vial over his hand, pouring it carefully into the scorched symbol. He winced, but did his best to keep any real outward display of the discomfort from reaching her. After what Puck had told him, he thought it best to prevent any signs of weakness from being present between them again. "I almost miss those days. You were easier to understand then, I guess."
"Likewise," he said softly, unable to hide a grunt of pain and an instinctive jerk of the arm backward as the fluid spilled out into his palm. "I do believe things were easiest right before . . . before the eclipse."
"I almost refused to do the last task. It was immature, but I thought about it; you know, just to have a prince in the forest waiting for me for the rest of my life," she confessed. Nuada felt a spring of joy quivering three beats of his heart at those words. She smiled and looked down at the wound. The fluid was absorbing immediately in the symbol creating a less angry wound with each drop it drank. She stared down at it in amusement. Nuada noticed an odd colour moving across her eyes. "If I had to do it over again," she laughed," I think this time I would try just . . ." her voice trailed off as the lavender he had seen before completely covered her irises. He sat forward and fixed his gaze on her, trying to know what it was that had brought forth her talents. She stared down at the wound and a frown twisted her mouth downward. "He's coming for you . . . for Nuala. He won't stop." She turned and looked into his eyes. He stared back in shock as her breathing became far too heavy for simply speaking. She looked down at his hand, not willing to look up as she spoke. "He wants to kill you . . . he wants . . . Grindel . . ." He continued to stare at her, frozen in amazement and now fear as her eyes began glowing all the brighter.
"The wound must be covered," a stern voice interjected. Nuada and Titania were shaken and both turned to see Puck grasping the roll of new cloth and now furiously covering the wound. Nuada grunted in pain as the pwca finished tying the cloth over and over until it was firmly bound. He rested both paws over the bandage and looked back and forth between them before addressing Titania. "That kind of magic exists in our world simultaneously along the evils of humankind, it is a mirrored effect. You mustn't dwell on it for long. It conflicts with the gift you were given and that could spell disaster for you until you better learn to harness the power."
"Thank you, my friend," Nuada said gratefully. Puck turned to him, worriedly.
"Sire, I was going to wait to share this with you until morning, but in light of the circumstances I believe it is something rather pressing and needs to be shared now," Puck said. Nuada looked at him with concern. It wasn't like Puck to try and keep something unsaid for any amount of time when it wasn't a personal matter. "Jareth sent a report this morning , sire. They have reached Grindel's last stronghold. He wants your word on the matter, but requests that you issue a command to annihilate all those within it."
"At once, tell him he has my word and he may do this as he sees fit," the prince said quickly. Puc frowned. He rubbed his paws together anxiously and looked back at Titania for a moment. "Well? Go and deliver the message to one of his."
"Yes, your majesty," Puck replied sadly. He hopped off the bed, looking at Titania once more. "Right away."
"And tell him to send me word the moment Grindel is dispatched," Nuada called after him.
Puck hesitated at the doorway, clutching the edge of the door and leaning against it almost remorsefully. Titania watched him, confused as to why such commands would make the rabbit-fairy so upset. He nodded and rubbed one paw against his head for a moment. "Yes, your majesty," he muttered. He turned and hopped out of the door. "At once," the last audible comment came from the doorway.
"You don't think that there was something else, do you?" Titania asked.
"That is not in his nature," Nuada replied. "It is part of what makes him so wonderfully indisposable."
"He seemed unusually sad for some reason," Titania commented. Nuada reached out and gently put a hand on the side of her face, turning her to face him. She looked down and sighed heavily. Nuada moved his hand under her chin and tried to lift her gaze to meet his. She sighed and finally looked back at him. Relief filled him at her gaze and the calm it brought to them both as she let go of the pwca's display and concentrated on only what was sitting in front of him. She reached up and took the hand cradling her face into her own hand and moved more fully onto the bed sitting right beside him. "You need to rest."
"Will you stay with me?" he asked hopefully.
She smiled and looked to the side, coyly for a moment, then turned back to him and nodded. He breathed a sigh of relief and thanked every available power in the universe. That made at least a small stream of things that had gone smoothly since her last sway that distanced her heart from his. All he needed to do was keep it going for the next thousand years or so.
(*)
Late that night, Nuala felt the burning in her hand return. She groaned and shifted. Something was wrong. As well as the humans and even Abraham had taken care of her, she still felt that something was terribly wrong. She suddenly felt the urge to look at the wound itself once more. She pulled furiously at the bandage and stripped the cloth and gauze away from her palm. The shape was difficult to discern in the dark at the moment and the salves made it all the more difficult. Something was different about it, though, very different. She furrowed her brow, allowing her keen eyes to adjust to the darkness as she looked more closely at it. In a flash, the symbol contorted silently. Her eyes began trembling as the shape morphed into the wyvern that signified her uncle, Beowulf. She gasped. The symbol twisted and contorted all the more, seeming to try and shake itself free from her hand. To her surprise, that is exactly what it did, hovering in front of her for a moment as if just a pencil sketch drawn in the air.
She gasped and watched in shock as the symbol reared its head back and let out a piercing shriek. While shrieking the head shook violently until it became the face of a creature unlike anything she had ever seen. She screamed at the vision in return. The creature suddenly rushed forward, flying straight into her throat. She coughed violently, trying desperately to call for Abraham immediately. She suddenly felt paralyzed and found that she could produce no sound, no sound whatsoever. She frowned and clawed at her throat as she felt a burning moving through it and deep into her chest. She screamed and writhed madly, finding that she was still unable to make any sound or productive movement at all. Panic filled her and the sound of her own heartbeat became too loud to bear any longer. Just when she was sure that she would die from terror and exhaustion, she heard familiar sound.
"Nuala? Nuala, can you hear me?" Abraham shouted. The darkness, pain, and resonant pulse ceased as his voice reached her. She found her senses returned to her and that she was lying in the bed in the hospital wing where she had fallen asleep. Without a word she leapt forward and embraced her husband, sobbing furiously. Abraham held her gently and tried to soothe her with his own mind. "You were having a nightmare, a bad dream."
Nuala looked down at her hand seeing that it was still bandaged. Something had changed and it made her ill to see it. A small stream of blood was now trickling from one of the edges of the bandage. She breathed sharply and closed her eyes, gripping Abraham all the more. "Something is coming, Abraham. Something I cannot fight," she whispered.
"I will," he said firmly and quickly. She relaxed into him all the more at his words and buried herself in the comforting sound of his heartbeat. "Whatever it takes, Nuala, I will protect you."
"I will need it," she muttered as unconsciousness beckoned her yet again. I will need you and it seems we will all need my uncle, she thought. There will be blood, Abraham, and I pray it will not be yours.
