one more tale

Once there were two knights and they roamed all over the land doing good deeds for some and bad deeds to others as befitted their needs and humor.  In fact, they knew no master but their own wills.

One summer day, they were riding along and entertaining each other with tall tales of former exploits.  One said to the other, "Aye, Colum, do you not remember?  I had the dragon below my boot and he begged my mercy to let him go or kill him quickly, through the heart.  That was when I got my fine shield, from his hoard."

"Oh, you are a sly liar, Arne," said his companion, "But I know you lifted that shield from the drunken soldier of the Empress' Army in the Tavern of the Green Horse, and I had drugged him first and deserved first choice of his goods, you rascal."

"My dear Colum, would you doubt the word of your constant guide and follower?  Truly, you cut me to the core."  He had a face of wounded soul and his friend a face of ruffled pride, but within moments their merriment burst through like water from behind the ice dams in spring.

On they traveled on their lazy mounts, whose ragged tails swatted uselessly at flies and other things that bite and sting.  Their jocularity rolled before them like a king's carpet and sank into the dry, yellow dust like the few precious drops of rain in a drought-stricken land, or like a child's angry tears on a dry bit of bread.  They had no cares or worries, and all was well in their simple world.

As the day stretched towards evening, they realized they were still a long way off from the next village, and, for reasons too numerous and complex to mention at this time, could not return to where they had come from.  One turned to the other with the furrowed brow of one put out and asked his plan for the night.  The other also brooded but said he knew how to build a fire and light it with magic rocks he had stolen from a wizard.  His companion opened his mouth to scoff, but their talk was interrupted by a scream.

A child had been caught by a wolf!  There he was, the great, hairy bastard, trotting jauntily over the fields with the babe caught by its shirt in his slavering, foul-breathed mouth.  All jokes were laid aside as the sense of indignation rose and the two knights spurred their steeds to action, a chase over the spongy grass.  The wolf did not seem to stretch his legs or hurry his pace, and yet he stayed far ahead for many long minutes.  But finally, the knights drew near to his tail and one slashed with his sword and the other poked with his lance.  The wolf jumped as if he were a sleeping donkey, bitten by a famished fly, and with a grunt, dropped the child on the ground.  Then he galloped off with sharp barks that almost sounded like laughing.

The two knights felt heroic.  One scooped up the child with his mighty arm and set him on the saddle before him.  The other asked with a bright and confident voice where the youth's home was.  The little one pointed with a shaking finger over the darkening fields, ever softer and purpler in the falling cloak of night.  Off they went, but at a gentle pace, so as not to jar the child more than what he had already suffered.

The sky was red behind them and black before them and their horses trotted briskly and at every turn they tried to break into a run.  The child kept his arm pointing like a compass needle, drawing them around the hills and mounds of rocks, that the old ones said were the stone houses of the dead.  Soon the little star of a hearth beckoned them and a mother's wailing called them, and when they rode up with the child the shouts of joy warmed their hearts and bowls of stew and mugs of beer warmed their stomachs, and that night soft, thick blankets warmed their feet.  In the early morning they set off with blessings and waving arms and returned to the road.  As the sun rose higher they slaked their thirst with their water pouches, soon emptied.  "Come, dear companion," said one to the other, "Let me wet my tongue tip with just a drop of your water.  I swear on my sword I will refill your pouch from the cleanest flowing fountain in the next town."

"Nay, good friend," answered the other, "For I was about to say the same to you."

"Let me at least try to squeeze a drop from your pouch.  You are never so careful as I to pull the last bit from the depths, be it water or-" and his friend elbowed his ribs sharply as he passed the leather bag.  "You scoundrel!" cried the thirsty one, "You took more beer from them!  And after their kindness to us last night?"

"Kindness?  It's a just reward for chasing a wolf like the one we saw yestere'en.  And they had children a-plenty, if you bothered to notice, and they would hardly miss that scrawny one.  Truly, the kindness was on our part."

"You are a greedy rogue, and I wonder that I should continue in your company," said the other grimly.  But then a smile lit his countenance and he held up his large pouch.  It jiggled and squawked.  Like chickens.

"Ah, good companion!" cried the beer thief, "Who would be my friend if you were not?  To whom would I be friend if not to you?  For we are of one soul as much as can be."

The two knights went on down the road with their mounts' swishing tails behind them and the echo of their laughter too, and then that echo came back like the laughing bark of a great wolf.  The two friends turned as one in surprise and saw nothing behind them but the last pile of rocks, gray like a wolf's hair and bristly like his coat.

another tale

So once there was an old woman and she lived all by herself in her little house, all away from the little town.  Sometimes there were travelers coming down the little road, but most times not.  The old woman had her life that hardly ever changed and she was happy with nobody to bother her.  Then one day a rider came down the road.

He was riding on a big brown horse, and she was lazy and slow but he did not seem to mind very much.  He was turning his head and looking every which way like he was lost or had lost something.  The horse came up to the old woman's little house and stopped.  The rider didn't notice for a minute or two that his mount wasn't moving at all anymore, she had been moving so slowly.  The old woman was beating her rugs when she saw them approach and when they stopped she hobbled right up to the side of the horse and croaked, "Can I help you with something, young man?"

"Well, Old Aunt," said the young rider politely, "I am on a mission from the Duke of Ouveriandor, from across the mountains.  I am to find a girl who is special."

The old woman laughed and laughed and gasped out at the end of her happy howling, "My dear, surely you must know by now that all girls are special."

"Well, yes, Old Aunt," answered the rider, more than a little flustered and shifting uncomfortably in his seat, "but this girl is special in a different way.  She can speak to the beasts."

The old woman turned and walked away, waving her arms over her head and called back so the rider could hear, "Dear young man, those are but stories that we fools in the little towns tell each other on dark nights when there are storms or over the feast fire for our enjoyment.  There is no truth to them, except, maybe a stretching of what is really truth."

"But, Old Aunt, I must be sure of these things before I return to the Duke.  How far away is the town from here?"  The old woman heaved a heavy sigh.  She pointed to the sky and said, "Look, young man, the sun is sinking low.  You will not arrive before the dark comes and the roads are not safe at night.  There are thieves and...wolves."

"My horse is swift."  And the old woman eyed them.

"When she wants to be."  And the old woman eyed harder.

"I think you ought to stay in my little house tonight.  You will reach the town tomorrow and you will see how quickly you arrive.  But in the night, all the roads are longer and the hours are longer and our lives are that much shorter for it."

The old woman carefully took in her raggedy rugs and the rider helped.  Then they had a small but tasty supper of beer broth and hearty peasant bread.  Then they went to sleep to await the daylight.  The old woman hustled the rider, her guest, into her bedroom where she had put fresh sheets and blankets on her own bed for him, and before he could protest she slammed the door behind him.  "It is rude to refuse hospitality," he told himself.  And he buried himself in the bedclothes and was soon fast asleep.

And dreaming.

Dreaming of the Great City that was made of precious stones and jewels and shining metals and rose smooth and sleek into the sky.  Everybody dreamed of entering the Great City and here he was.  But in his dream, although he had forgotten.  Out of the corner of his eye, he kept seeing a silhouette, in the shape of a wolf with a big, toothy smile, but when he looked straight at the shadow there was none.  He was wandering the glittering streets under the orange-y sun when he saw the girl, the girl who must be the one he was seeking.  She was dressed in simple peasant's garb that looked washed-out and strange against all the richness of the City and then she saw him too.  And she ran.  She ran into a tiny alleyway and he followed, shouting, "Wait!  I have a message from the Duke!  I beg you listen and at least give an answer I can take back to my lord!"  Then they were at the end.  There was a wall.  And the girl was trapped with no way out.  She turned and stared with eyes full of terror and the rider was about to comfort her when he thought she was looking at something behind him.  He turned.  And saw nothing.  And he turned back.

And the demon's face filled his vision.  With a thousand dagger-teeth.  With leathery skin.  With long, long claws clicking on the stones.  With great black holes for eyes.  Holes that were empty and could not see but did see and saw him and he knew he had to get away.

And he sat up gasping in the old woman's bed.

The sun was just rising.  He went into the kitchen where the old woman was warming toast and porridge and they ate together.  He did not mention his dream.  They did not speak to each other over breakfast.

He went out to fetch his horse and she came lazily at his whistle.  As he laid saddle and bridle on the steed, the old woman said with words like wintery stones, "Some things are best left undisturbed.  You are young but you should learn this now."  Then he mounted up and thanked his host and she waved him off smiling.  Then he rode into the little town where nobody knew any answers to his questions.

In the middle of the night, he awoke with a start in his lumpy inn bed.

He had just realized that the dress on the girl in his dream was exactly the same as the old woman's.

And at that moment a gleeful wolf howl came in through the window.