Part 23 (1/2)
”Sorry. I forget you are touchy.”
”And I cannot forget you have a wife.”
”Just so. Let's be off, then.”
”Ulrich, this is stealing.”
”Not if you sprinkle some faery coin in our wake.”
She dug for the purse she'd placed in the saddlebag. Crystal coins tinkling on cobbles, Gossamyr tugged Fancy along, into a walk. They would keep to the narrow streets, Ulrich had instructed. Easier to avoid a patrolling guardsman, or a ruckus.
”My wife wanted to come to Paris,” Ulrich offered in the quiet of their walk. ”I promised her the trip when Rhiana was old enough to manage the travel.”
”How young was your daughter when you...disappeared?”
”Two years. That was a little over a week ago. And twenty years ago. She was this high to my knees and used to wobble when she walked.”
”Did the other man-the real father-ever visit?”
”He was never found.” Gossamyr looked to him for explanation but he merely shrugged. ”Lydia is a strong woman. She does what she must to survive.”
”Like marry again when her husband goes missing?”
”Indeed. I must concede it was good for them both to have a man in the home. A female needs a man-well, unless she be a faery warrior. I cannot get the enormity of what has occurred into my skull. It yet aches.”
”You have had but a week to grieve. Your wife has had twenty years.” Gossamyr used the measurement with growing knowledge. She was little older than twenty years. So odd that Ulrich had lost the length of her lifetime, and yet, they were peers.
They walked onward through the dark streets, Fancy's hooves a singular echo in the night. But close, the whisper of liquid called to Gossamyr's senses. ”What is that sound?”
”Hmm... The Seine! Filthy and muddied, the river is the lifeline of Paris.”
Yes, but where there was water... ”Might we step down to the river? I'm in need of a splash. I hadn't chance to quench my thirst in that tavern.”
”Sounds perfect.” Ulrich skipped ahead and pointed out a stone staircase at river's edge. ”Though I wouldn't swim in this brew,”he called as he descended the wide limestone steps. ”It's an awful mix. 'Course, I could endure a splash myself.”
Gossamyr paused on the top step as she watched Ulrich skip down the wide stone stairs and bend over the brown waters to dip in his hands. Twenty years. Stolen. Unthinkable that any fee could be so cruel to one who had merely stumbled by accident into Faery-even s.h.i.+nn.
”We are a mischievous lot,” she muttered.
Tying Fancy to a post near the stairway, Gossamyr then descended the steps, taking each wide level in a skip.
The saddlebag abandoned behind his feet, Ulrich poured handfuls of water over his face. Kneeling forward, he had to check his balance. He didn't want to take a dip in waters rumored to receive the king's privy, the Greve's victims, and any other waste the city dumped in it. It did not smell bad. But neither did the taste r.i.m.m.i.n.g his tightly closed lips entice.
But bone, it felt refres.h.i.+ng to wash away the day. Too much had happened, and his confession to Gossamyr had only dredged up misery. He regretted his life for the family he had lost. If only there were some way to take back control, to return it to how it should be.
Only a fool entertains foolish thoughts. He must accept- Yeow- The snarling beast that leaped for Ulrich's head had not in mind for mental suffering. Jaws wide and long fangs bared, it spat drool and slimy water as it neared Ulrich's face.
FOURTEEN.
Gossamyr spied the kelpie as its oval nostrils emerged on the calm surface of the river. It approached with stealth; kelpies were not known to attack. It was the werefrog clinging to the kelpie's head that set Gossamyr sprinting down the wide steps to Ulrich.
She reached the soul shepherd as his upper body submerged. Lunging, she managed to grab an ankle. Struggling fiercely, Ulrich fought the werefrog underwater while Gossamyr strained to keep hold of his ankle. If he was pulled completely underwater, the kelpie would swim over him and weight him down, drowning a fine feast for the werefrog.
There was nothing on sh.o.r.e to anchor her foot to. Gossamyr leaned back and managed to pull Ulrich with her. An arm slashed out of the water, spraying the sky and her with water and frog slime. An abbreviated yelp was instantly drowned.
The werefrog sprang up from the surface. Jaws dripping blood, it twisted its fat slug body and dived. In the next moment two arms slapped the surface.
Gossamyr gripped Ulrich's hands. He grasped hold-good, he was still conscious. She tugged and struggled with his weight and the slippery limestone that was more intent on serving as a slide than good purchase.
”Help!” Ulrich clung to the limestone, fighting against the unseen werefrog, which most likely clamped on a leg with fangs as long as a man's finger.
”I've got you!” Gossamyr called. ”Do not thrash about!”
”It's chewing off my leg!”
Her grasp slipped from his left wrist. Ulrich slid back, submerging to his chest.
The werefrog sprang into the air.
Using her free hand, Gossamyr grabbed her staff and swung. Bits of violet frog splat the walls of the riverbank and her face and the water surface.
The kelpie's nostrils sank. Ripples undulated away from the river's edge.
Ulrich, gasping and moaning, clung to the limestone.
Gossamyr levered him up and out to lay like a drowned rat upon the stone. She went immediately to his leg. Below the knee, exposed bits of flesh and blood revealed a neat bite, but small, considering the width of the werefrog's jaw.
”I think you'll live,” she commented, but went to ripping off the shredded part of his sodden hose to tie about the wound.
”What...”He coughed and choked and spat out drool of vicious brown water. ”Hades!”
”A werefrog,” Gossamyr answered. ”Just rest.” She swiped a hand over her forehead, dislodging a chunk of frog. ”It is dead.”
”Werefr-” And he fainted.
Fine and well- Gossamyr swung, smas.h.i.+ng her staff upon the chattering fangs that inched toward the saddlebag. The action sent the leather bag flying against the wall. It opened and out spilled the alicorn.
”No!” Gossamyr lunged for the horn and tipped it back inside the bag with her fingers.
A scan of her surroundings sighted frog bits, but none moving. Tucking the saddlebag to her stomach, she looked over the river's surface. Be the werefrog as irascible as a revenant?
Deep in the lush wilds of the Valois woods, in the exact center of the dense forest, sat a circular wattle-and-daub cottage with a low door to protect the inhabitants from charging marauders. A meadow thick with dandelion kites, the buzz of pollen-laden humble bees and gold coltsfoot blooms flourished twenty strides from the cottage.