Monday morning, I decided toconfront the Dark Fool.
Such a wearying presence he was in my life, toxic and cumbersome. Would that I were a human priest, who could hold a cross in front of myself, sprinkle him with holy water, and bid him a not-so-polite farewell. But no, not only was the Fool far too difficult to dispose of, now it seemed I must spend half the day traveling to Carterhaugh to give him a piece of my mind.
Thomas found me on my way out of the manor, protesting when I told him where I was going. I would be waylaid by outlaws, he said. Eaten by wolves (if he could recall the enormous beast I had faced down already, he might not be so concerned). Surely, I could wait, and he would accompany me, if all I needed was nuts and herbs.
I needed far more than nuts and herbs. I needed an explanation, and this was why Thomas could not come along. Amadan had already broken Thomas’s leg. For someone who swore he could not threaten the shepherd’s life, Amadan managed to do a great deal of damage, nonetheless. I needed to understand why.
But I can’t say Thomas’s offer did not tempt me. “You wish to come along?” I touched the side of his face; I had not been permitted to do so in ages. “Youcancome along?”
“Indeed.” Thomas took my hand in his and brought it to his lips. The soft brush of them against my skin sent shivers of delight through me; the wish for them to run the length of my body, for him to explore me as he would.
The fantasy vanished when he added, “It will have to be when my father has no work for me, when I am not scheduled to meet with the master of the hounds, and when there is not so much to be made ready for the harvest boon.”
In other words, never.
I dropped my gaze, shoulders slumping. “You do have much to do around the manor these days. I am surprised your father managed without you for so long.” I tilted my head at him. “I suppose Margaret will have been a great deal of help?” There was a bite to it, there would always be a bite to it, when I spoke her name.
Thomas opened his mouth to reply but was interrupted by the clearing of a throat.
The baron watched us, his grey eyes the same as my love’s, but flat as stone. “Thomas,” he said, “there is a matter I must discuss with you. Come to my antechamber, please.”
Thomas looked to the baron, then back to me, guilt coloring his cheeks. “Please,” he said. “Do not venture into the forest without escort. I could not bear if you came to harm.”
I was so tempted to listen but pulled my hand out of Thomas’s grasp. From inside myself, I pulled forth warm essence, a fragrance as of honey and roses I allowed to wrap around him. “I will come to no harm in the forest. Do you not call me your wood nymph? Or you did.”
Thomas’s cheeks went pale; his eyes glazed over with enchantment. I hated myself just a little for this bewitchment I wove.
Turning away from him, I touched the arrowhead in my pouch. Such a modest thing it was, to cause such damage, small and carved from stone. And soon as I had pulled it out of him, Evander’s wound closed, as if it had never been.
“I have never known any to cure elf-shot,” Gib had said to me in awe.
No mortal ever has, perhaps. But a fae could. A fae did.
Now, let me see to its source.
Amadan.
I would not seek him by the sacred well this time. Had he not found me in the baron’s own garden? I must only make my way between the Yarrow and Ettrick rivers, and have the trickster meet me there. I could already feel the closeness of Faery, and contrasted it with the closed-off tightness I had in the manor of Baron de Lyne.You were not meant for such,the trees seemed to whisper.Return to where you belong.
In the lushness of the forest, surrounded by the rich scents of the late summer and early harvest, I could smell musk and moss, the rich loam and corrupted holiness that was the scent of the Amadan Dubh.
“Come out!” I cried. “By ash and yew, by willow and oak. Dark Fool, do you appear before me now.” It was not a request.
There came a rustling in the brush to the left of that juniper tree, a fluttering of ferns as though of wings. And out from the foliage he appeared.
Deep gold were his garments now, shading into red. Burnt orange and yellow, fading green, and deep crimson tipped the ends of his ebon curls. He was the autumn incarnate, so resplendent my breath caught in my throat, though his face remained as young as spring.
The mark I had given him was long gone now, more’s the pity. There was naught to distract from how handsome he was.
The Fool’s emerald eyes flashed with sickly fire, like the unholy gleam of ghost lights over the marsh. “Mairi Grieve’s daughter, as you seem.” He bit off the greeting, and barely even lowered his head.
We both know I am more than that.But I would not encourage him by speaking so aloud.
I smiled, with unctuous charm I had learned from the Fool himself. “What is the matter, my lord? Are you missing something? Say, perhaps, this?” And I opened my palm to reveal the bloodied arrowhead. Hewouldanswer for it.
Amadan barely even glanced at it. “Oh, you removed it. Good.” His eyelids were heavy with disdain.
I had not expected contrition, not from any fae, and certainly not from him. But this was underwhelming, to say the least. “Is that all? ‘You removed it.’ I did more than that. I saved a man’s life. Sir Evander Douglas was nearly slain!”
