Uncharted
ASH
I have been pacing in front of this dying campfire for the last twenty wasted minutes contemplating what to do about the missive I received.
I swore to Daphne that I would retrieve her sister. I promised her.
But… the need to know what happened, to make certain that Daphne is safe… then grab her close and tie her to me - it bites into me like a snake, poisoning my blood and burning all logical thought from my brain.
All I know at the moment is anger for the council in their naming my little peasant as a fugitive and the very real fear that they may catch up with her then execute her before I can stop them.
Klyesque is with her. She will not fail to protect her. She will not.
But the need to know what happened and where she has gone wins over as I scream into the sky and decide we must abandon this quest to find my future bride.
“We must go back,” I say simply. “I have to know what happened.”
“Wait just a aminute…” Bregda says in his half whisper of a voice as he circles around the campsite to stand before me. “That is not the deal you made. You said you swore to our-” he cuts off, glaring at Finn for a moment before walking directly up to him and kicking out his bad leg.
“Aaaahhh!!!” he screams. “You fucking monster! Why did you-” but his shouting is cut short when Bregda stomps on his injury and presses in with his shifted boot.
His hoove might have been more pleasurable to see at work.
The rest of us watch in utter fascination, none of us truly caring, as Finn’s face goes from blistering red to paste white and he falls unconscious.
“Praise the Goddess,” Dionie mumbles, causing Bregda to flash him a wild, untempered grin. “Might we just keep him like that? Sedated? Tie him to his horse and let him rest?”
Laksha giggles ghoulishly and Dionie grins at him.
Ignoring them both, my mind in too much of a rage to allow me to chuckle properly, I grant Bregda my full attention once more, silently thanking him for assuring our privacy.
He marches toward me with clenched fists and spits out, “You said you swore to our queen. You said you promised to retrieve her kin! We made a deal, you and I! The entire reason I am here with you lot is to serve her.”
With a heaving sigh I peer toward the ground. “Is protecting your queen not high on your list of priorities? Does one not trump the other?”
Bregda growls deep in his chest. “Yes.”
“And would you not like to meet your queen? To make sure that my allegiance to her is true?” It’s a long shot, once kelpies commit to a job they are not known to abandon their missions for the sake of another, but he’s already left one post for my little peasant. Why not this? I am playing at manipulation with this creature, which is not something considered smart with his particular species, but I can already see it working in the faint red glow behind his magicked faerie eyes. I add, “I must know that she is safe. I must.”
He glares at the ground, his delusionary black mane of hair wisping in the cool breeze of the morning, as real as if this were his true form. “I must know as well,” he admits.
“And just think,” I say with a foul grin, one that comes much too easily to me, “should we happen upon the council first, perhaps you can feed on them. All that high magic… all that faerie flesh.”
The grin the Bregda gives me now, his head snapping upward devilishly, should frighten me, but it does not. Not because I fear the creature. Not because I think I couldn’t best him in a fight, but because it speaks to his lawlessness. To his disloyalty of his deemed superiors. He could turn on us at any moment. Decide that our quest is folly and he’d rather go it alone, but yet somehow… I don’t think he will. Somehow… I know he is loyal to my peasant and to his former queen, Clayeira.
“Clayeira truly was a magnificent soul, wasn’t she?” I hear myself ask him.
He loses his smile and says. “Yes. She was. And I will hear the truth of her demise. If not from you than from her daughter, my queen.”
I nod.
“Then we best figure out where she’s headed,” Dionie says and I grimace.
“I already know,” I say softly, my eyes on Finn’s unconscious body. “She’s gone to meet that blasted witch. She’s gone to the place of her origins. She’s heading to the Lost Gate. To the Missing Meadow. Unfortunately, that is the one place on this blasted continent that I have never been and the only map I possess with even a clue in which direction to head for is back at the castle.” I don’t say what I am thinking, which is that Klyesque no doubt took it with her when she decided to aid Daphne in their fool’s errand. No. Instead, I leave the bait where it lies, at the feet of the two Hidden Fae in our company. “No one has any idea where it is.”
Bregda and Laksha share a smile before Bregda says in his demonic brogue, “Are you forgetting that we once called such a place home? Silly prince? Your pretense is disturbing and if I could not taste your intent in the treble of your voice, I would abandon you here. Do not toy with me, for I am not nearly as addlebrained as you royals might think.”
Touche’.
Bregda fixes his eyes on Finn and says, “But we will not take him. He can never know where it is. He is weak hearted and will betray us in the end.”
“Are you a witch then?” I ask him, raw amusement bubbling forth despite that there is no time for such things. “Because that is not the first time I’ve heard such a claim.”
Bregda doesn’t laugh. “Either we leave him or I kill him. Make your choice.”
I think of the Winter Realm... of Daphne's sister... and when I meet Dionie's eyes I can see he already knows what I am planning.
Dionie groans, "I'd have rather escorted the bastard home and then gone on myself."
I shake my head, "He'll not be returning home, friend. For he has been spying for the Winter Queen and should she learn of my broken curse, my mother will be in danger. Return him to her. With or without his head. But not at the cost of your own." Dionie and I link arms and I whisper, "Swear to me. Swear that you will drop him and go."
He whispers back, "You swear. Swear that you will be safe with-" he glares at my new comrades "-them."
We simply nod, knowing that neither can speak the vow of an uncharted future.
Bregda hisses, "How sweet. Are we fucking leaving, or what?"